Prism
by Anna Faze
Summary: A father and daughter, bound by blood and torn apart by secrets. There are a hundred versions of the truth, it all depends which way the light shines. AU.
1. Chapter 1

Endless thanks always to Liz, Holly & Annette.

Charlie and Bella tell this story but Edward will be along!

Disclaimer: Stephenie Meyer owns them. There is no drug use in this story.

~~~ Charlie ~~~

I'm wide awake listening to the rain, as another minute passes on the clock by the bed, thinking about paint.

Bella will be here in less than two days. For the first time since she was a baby, for the first time since I sent her away all those years ago, my daughter is returning to this strange place under the clouds. I wonder if it will help, in a place as foreign to her as Forks, if she has one place, a single room, that feels something like home.

Her room in Phoenix is blue, painted long ago by my wife, but the exact shade eludes me, and the harder I try to conjure up an image of those walls, the further into the murky distance they recede. My daughter's birthright overshadows everything, always, even things as light and sparkling as blue walls and homecomings.

Billy taught me something though. There was a night not long ago when the iron bands around my chest were so tight I couldn't breathe, and the strain of waiting became too much. I phoned him that night in desperation and he settled in on the other end of the line, his quiet, patient, words a salve to my raw nerves. He told me of the ancient Quileute magic that frees the mind and the soul - the spirit - from the here and now and releases it to travel where it will. I'd heard the Quileute talk of it before.

I've tried a few times since that night, to open my mind to things I have no reason to doubt, and I don't believe my spirit has gone anywhere. The Quiletue have magic that I do not and while they roam, I remain earthbound.

I've discovered, though, that the act of meditating completely on one thing can keep others at bay, and maybe that's all Billy intended. It's enough.

I turn my full attention to the red numbers on the clock and work to release the tension in my fists and jaw, beginning a journey that will take place only in the confines of my mind, only in this room.

It takes a long time, but eventually the tension eases enough and, in my mind's eye, I drift out of the bedroom window and away from the pre-dawn gloom. I float up through the delicate mist, the gentle sigh that's all the clouds have left to give for now, and over the forest. I don't look down, not until I'm far above the rainclouds and the forest is so far away it can't reach me anymore. Gliding like a bird on the wing, over mountaintops and rivers, cities and deserts, further and further away from Forks until, finally, I reach a small house in Phoenix.

It's an ordinary house, just like thousands of others scattered along the wide Arizona streets, unremarkable to anyone but me. I hesitate at the front door, almost able to smell the sharp scent of creosote in the cold air, to feel the dark eyes in the shadows at my back, and adjust my thinking.

Reflections ricochet off the walls of the rooms within, colored and shaped by the people who live in them; vibrant fabrics strewn carelessly over tables and easels, paintbrushes shoved in green watered jars, like flowers in a vase, glossy hardcovers and worn paperbacks stacked on every surface. Where I have hunkered down under the low clouds in Forks and let the darkness cover me, Renee has filled her life in Phoenix with color and brightness. Her strident, unconvincing attempt to keep the shadows from falling too heavily.

But it won't be like that now. It's hard to imagine the house packed away, forlorn and sparse, but as I enter the front door I imagine it as it must be tonight. Packing boxes lining bare walls, some with open lids revealing choatic contents, others neatly stacked, labelled and taped, waiting for the truck to bring them north to Forks.

I ease past them and up the stairs as though I'm really there, straight past my wife's bedroom, knowing that my fragile refuge in this unreality will dissolve if I so much as glance in her direction. Slowly I enter the room where my daughter lays sleeping. In my imagination she rests easily, the dark fan of her hair on the pillow catching briefly in the corner of my eye, before I turn away. I focus on the walls of her bedroom.

The gloom is too deep though. I can't see my way through it and I lighten the scene a little, sprinkling rays of summer sunshine through the window, trying to catch the color. It's too much though and everything rushes in, a hundred scenes from the only season I've ever really seen this room in. A bright summer day explodes before my eyes in a cacophony of color and movement. Sunshine floods the room, a sprinkler swishes across the lawn outside, pink watermelon drips in my daughter's hands, music plays on the radio and my wife's laughter echoes through the house.

Reality bites quickly, snapping at my heels and chasing me home until, with a jolt, I'm back, back in Forks where the fight to stop the forest invading everything never ends, and the rain roars down.

~~~ O ~~~

I fight my way out from under the blankets, lurch down the stairs and stand hunched over the kitchen sink until the trembling stops. When it does I turn the light on, pour a glass of water and stand at the refrigerator, gazing at the faded square of paper stuck on the door.

Since my daughter was old enough to hold a pencil, a package from her has arrived in my mailbox every week, a bundle of photos or drawings, report cards or letters. There are boxes stacked neatly in the attic, one for each year, every piece of paper carefully smoothed out and kept within. Except for this one. This piece of paper has hung on my fridge for nearly a decade.

It's a drawing of one small and two tall stick figures standing next to that unremarkable house in Phoenix. Renee and I stand on either side of Bella, holding her hands and beaming lopsided smiles. Strips of Renee's hand painted material are glued onto the paper for our clothes and hair. A rainbow and a bright sun soar over our heads, sparkling with the glitter my daughter pasted on to color them.

Most of the glitter has fallen off now and the letters have faded to grey, but I can still read the words. "_To __Daddy_," they say in crooked writing, "_Love __Bella__"_. The second "e", the one in her name, is back-to-front and there is something so tender, something so endearingly innocent about that back-to-front "e" that, even after all this time, it moves me.

I walk to the kitchen window and lean in close, my breath forming a cold, grey cloud on the glass. Hidden in the darkness beyond my yard is the forest that's the lifeblood of this town. The trees that have been logged and milled for decades are the reason that Forks exists at all. Hikers come from miles around to trek in that forest, to admire its beauty and uncover its secrets. Fishermen gather on the banks of the river that winds through it, the trees rising like a wall at their backs as they bait up and cast out. Botanists, hunters, campers; the forest teems with energy and activity and industry.

So much life for such a deadly place.

As if on cue, as if the mere thought of those ancient moss covered trees is enough to stir the demons, the sound I've been dreading all night shatters the silence. The glass of water flies from my hand as I lunge for the phone, a whispered prayer falling unbidden from my lips.

_Please, don't be Billy._

"Chief?" My mouth is so dry I can't speak. I stare greedily at the water on the floor.

"Chief? Are you there?"

"I'm here, Newton." I clear my throat. "What is it?"

My relief at hearing the voice of my deputy, instead of Billy's, is not quite absolute and I'm not sure why. I puzzle over it as Newton gives me details of a car wreck on the outskirts of town, and I focus as he delivers this news, all business. He's established that the victims are from out of town, so I give him a few instructions and leave it to him to take care of the paperwork and the phone calls.

I stare at the phone for a long moment after hanging up. There could only be one outcome from a call from Billy at this hour. Seventeen years without my family, seventeen long, dead years are about to end and a part of me, however small, was hoping for the news that would prevent their return. It doesn't take long to figure it out.

If the demons return to the forest it's better that it happens now, tonight, before my daughter is anywhere near Forks. The thought of sending her and her mother away a second time is unbearable.

The yellow cupboards Renee painted so long ago brighten slowly as morning light creeps across the floor. I pick the glass up and wipe the water, sit at the kitchen table and rub my thumb over that faded back-to-front "e", trying to remember the exact shade of blue.

~~~ O ~~~

Staying strong and healthy, trying to prolong my life for as long as possible, is crucial but my morning run has had an added bonus over the years. It's given me a reason to get out of bed in the morning, a shape to the day. Somewhere to begin. Today is no different.

When I return Sue Clearwater is perched on my front step next to Billy. A wicker basket containing plastic bottles and flowers rests at her feet, and Billy has his legs stretched out on a cooler. I greet her warily, unsure whether she's here out of genuine friendship or because Harry sent her. As we follow Sue inside Billy shrugs helplessly at her back, his eyes dull, and I have my answer.

Harry Clearwater wants to make sure there's no last minute change of heart. He's never really understood. Used to knowing everything and being denied nothing, my refusal to open the curtain so he can shine his spotlight on the parts of my life I insist remain private infuriates him. His control will never extend to my family because I won't allow it too.

My marriage mystifies him. To him it's a puzzle to be solved, a conundrum to be clinically inspected from every angle. How is it that my wife and I have lived apart for seventeen years and managed to keep our relationship intact? Why haven't we moved on, picked up with someone else? Why haven't we been defeated by time and distance and loneliness? He's grateful that we haven't, it all fits with his plans, but still he's baffled.

I don't think he's allowed himself to love anyone since that night in the meadow, since the night his brother died.

Sue is crouched at the open fridge, unpacking containers of food from the cooler and stacking them neatly on the shelves. A spasm of guilt ripples across my shoulders.

When she straightens up I hug her briefly, a mumbled thanks in her ear and she smiles tightly in return. "I hope this works out for you, Charlie, I really do." She picks up a bottle and a cleaning rag from the basket and leaves the room, her tread heavy on the stairs.

Billy puts some coffee on, squinting at me as he fits the filter into the pot. "Get much sleep?" he asks.

I shrug.

"I thought as much. You look like hell."

"I had a phone call early this morning."

Billy wouldn't be here if that call had been from the Reservation, I know that, but it's reassuring all the same when he calmly continues measuring out the coffee, waiting for me to explain.

"There was a car crash out on the 101. No one local."

He raises an eyebrow, his dark eyes steady.

"I'm alright," I say. "I'll be alright. It's just the waiting." I shrug again.

"It's not long now, Charlie, you'll get through. What time does their flight arrive?"

"10.15."

I check the clock above the table. It's 9.20am. Twenty-five hours to wait.

Billy hands me a cup of coffee. "You're driving to Port Angeles to pick them up?" I nod.

Outside my kitchen window the rain has eased, the forest beyond my yard a murky silhouette veiled by the grey haze. I sip the coffee, shuddering as it hits my empty stomach, and remember when Renee was pregnant; how coffee made her sick, how even the taste of it on my lips was too much. It was easy to give it up.

It was a day so different to this one, that most bittersweet of days so long ago. The afternoon I came home from work to a house filled with rare sunshine, my wife caught in its rays at the kitchen sink. She looked so beautiful standing there, her long, dark hair almost red in the sunlight, but when she turned to me her face was tear-stained and twisted.

We hadn't planned on having a baby, not for a long time anyway, and the shock washed over us like red-hot lava, searing us together while we still could be.

The decision had been made before we got married and we stuck to it, steadfast through the months of Renee's pregnancy. Harry tried everything to change our minds but we were resolute. As soon as her pregnancy was over Renee would leave Forks and take our baby far away to safety.

The months of waiting for the birth of our child felt like a slow walk to the gallows, the impending separation threatening to strangle the life out of us as surely as the noose would. I thought about my father a lot. As fatherhood approached I felt a kinship with him that I'd never felt before, not even when standing in his place in the meadow.

I wondered at his choice to keep me with him in Forks, to raise me under the shadows of the clouds, so close to the forest. I never understood his choice but I never judged him for it either. People must be allowed to go to hell their own way. It's the weight of the cross we bear, the curse of the Swan family; that we must choose at all.

My father couldn't bear to send his child away and I couldn't bear not to.

It's the rain, the insistent rain, pouring its fury down on my house that pulls me back to the here and now. I tip the cold coffee into the sink and check the clock.

11.15.

Twenty-three hours.

Seventeen years and twenty-three hours.

~~~ O ~~~

I call the station to check that Newton has everything under control and go looking for Billy. He's crouched on the floor in Bella's room putting her new bed together, the headboard leaning on her old crib in the corner.

"I thought maybe I'd take it out to Leah and Sam," he says, "unless you wanted to keep it."

"Leah and Sam?"

"You hadn't heard? The baby's due in the summer, I think." He leans over the crib, testing the joins and eyeing the lines. "All it needs is a lick of paint and it'll be good as new."

He might still be speaking but I'm not listening. The walls of Bella's old room have my full attention. All this time and I never noticed that those walls are the same blue as her room in Phoenix.

The brief moment of relief, of feeling that maybe everything will work out, doesn't last. The distraction is gone and in its place is raw, wild panic. I stand rigid, braced against the door frame to steady myself before I speak.

"What if they come back to the forest, Billy?"

He finishes tightening a bolt and puts the wrench down carefully, his eyes flickering to the fading scars that run up and down my arms. He leans against the wall next to me and I know without looking that his dark eyes have taken on the glazed look I know so well. Those dull, flat eyes mean that he's disappeared into another world, into the place where his other self resides.

I've known Billy all my life. I've lived in this house for two decades but Billy's place at the Reservation has been more of a home to me than this house has. We're bound together by experience and shared purpose and simple, enduring friendship. But Billy is Quileute before he's anything else and when he speaks again it's in the strange monotone that signals his departure from free thought to his obedience of tribal law.

When he speaks again it's Harry Clearwater's words that come from his mouth.

"You're sure you don't want to just tell her?" he asks.

"No."

"Well, it's been four years with no trouble," he says. "And you're as healthy as an ox. It should be a very long time before she'll need to know."

I want to push against the limits placed on our friendship but I know it's useless to try. Billy has no more choice in this than I do. All the separate compartments of my life - my marriage, my daughter, the tribe, my job, this town - are about to collide and what I want more than anything is reassurance that it could all work out. But I want that reassurance from Billy, my friend, not from Harry the tactician, and that's just not possible.

"I wonder what she thinks," I say, more to myself than to him.

"Who? Bella?" I nod. "Thinks about what?"

"She's never asked. Renee told her out of the blue that they'd be moving here, that we'd all be living together in Forks and she never asked why." I step away from the door and crouch on the floor, picking up the sheet of instructions for the bed. "As far as she knows, our marriage was over long ago and suddenly we're back together. I wonder what she thinks."

"She's a teenage girl, Charlie. The last thing she wants to know is details of her parents' marriage." I put the piece of paper down again and walk to the door, pausing before I leave the room. Harry's words will have to do for now.

"What if it happens when she's here?"

"If it happens when she's here we'll protect her," he says, turning his glazed eyes to me. "We'll protect her just like we've always protected you, Charlie." He crouches by my daughter's bed and picks up the wrench. "We're good at what we do."

I watch for a moment as he wrestles another bolt into place, then I go back downstairs to stand at the kitchen window and watch the rain.

~~~ O ~~~

The late afternoon shadows reach like crooked fingers across my bed when I wake, and the nightmare lingers, throbbing at my temples. That elusive flash of red, luminous and haunting, darting through the trees. Always out of reach.

I can't remember the last time I slept without fear.

My skin feels too tight across my cheekbones and a cold shower doesn't help much. Sometimes no sleep at all is better than an hour's sleep but Sue insisted I lie down for a while.

The house is quiet as the night draws in, the only light coming from the muted television. Billy's face has a blue cast from the screen that makes him look older than he is and I sit heavily, pulled down by the weight of everything.

"Get any sleep?" he asks for the second time today.

"A bit. Where's Sue?"

"Gone already. Jake and Emily brought the truck out while you were sleeping and took her back with them." He reaches into his pocket, pulls out a foil packet and tosses it into my lap.

"Sue left them for you," he says. "Sleeping pills."

I put the packet in my pocket, knowing Harry sent them, knowing I won't use them.

"Did you talk to Renee today?" he asks.

"I phoned her earlier. The truck left this morning."

Renee's voice was pitched higher than usual and I knew why without needing to ask. She's struggling to reconcile her barely contained joy at coming home with her concern at how Bella will handle the move. A new town, a new school, new friends. A father who lives in the same house as her, not just a visitor for a few days every summer. We didn't talk for long. She and Bella are camping out in the empty house tonight, eating pizza and saying goodbye to their old lives.

Billy and I heat up some food and eat in front of the television. Billy watches the game and I pretend to. He watches a movie. I watch the clock.

The second movie is nearly finished when I realise that Billy has no way of getting home, that he's staying here tonight. Maybe it's only because it suits me, but I think that this was his decision, not Harry's. Billy knows better than anyone how long this last night will be for me.

"Billy, I just want to say thank -." He cuts me short with a wave of his hand, his eyes glinting in the half light and I know when I see them that I was right. I settle back on the couch.

I won't sleep tonight. I won't even try.

The nightmare, the flash of red out of the corner of my eye like a flame in the dark that I can never extinguish, can wait for another night.

Instead I'll sit here in this room with Billy, our faces flickering blue, and wait out the last, long night.

~~~ O ~~~

A watery sun finally breaks through the low clouds and I wake Billy, who's snoring gently with his head tipped back on the couch.

Suddenly there's not enough time. I throw the curtains open, put chains on the old truck's tires and straighten up the kitchen. Jake arrives to take Billy home, their beaming faces as they drive away making this feel almost real.

The drive through the flickering shadows to Port Angeles is like a dream, and when we return to Forks, three abreast in the faded Chevy, I feel as though I'm underwater, swimming through a strange world I have no place in. It's only when I unlock the door to the house and Renee turns to me, her face lit up with happiness, that I finally break the surface and breathe again.

~ O ~

Thanks so much for reading!


	2. Chapter 2

Hugs forever to Liz, Holly & Annette.

Charlie & Bella tell the story, but there will be Edward.

Disclaimer: Stephenie Meyer owns them.

~~~ Bella ~~~

I haven't thought of it for years, but when I was a little girl there was a game my mother played with me every day.

"Give me a color," she'd say.

Yellow was a good day, no skinned knees or bruised elbows, no petty aggravation in the playground. Blue was an OK kind of day, maybe my science test didn't go so well or I left my lunch at home. Silver were the best days of all. They were the days when there was no school at all, summer days of sparkling wings on dragonflies and bright stars in a warm clear sky. They were the days when Charlie came to stay.

It's hard to believe that every day will be like that now, that no one will ever have to say goodbye again.

There were kids at school whose parents were separated or divorced and it dawned on me slowly, as the summers passed, that their lives were more complicated than mine. There seemed to be a lot for them to cope with. Their lives became juggling acts of weekend visits to absent fathers and second weddings and new brothers and sisters. Looking at it from the outside, it seemed tumultuous and difficult. There was nothing like that in my childhood.

Renee would never let me visit Charlie in Forks - "he never sees the sun Bella, let him come here" - and I wondered sometimes if he had a secret love that he didn't want to share with me. I worked up the courage to ask him once, but he just blushed, worried at his moustache and slowly shook his head. I wanted him to elaborate, but "No," was all he said. I believed him.

There was never anyone else for my mother either. My father was the only man who ever phoned our house and his calls were always for me. I don't believe my mother is an unhappy person by nature, but there were days when a bleak melancholia would settle over her and her painting would become too bright, almost garish, in response.

It wasn't until the year I turned 14 that my eyes were opened to a new possibility.

A stolen kiss glimpsed through a window one summer's day, a shared, secret moment that became my secret too. I spent a few giddy hours wondering what that kiss meant, watching my mother and father closely, ready and eager to watch their transformations, waiting for a grand announcement. Surely something momentous must follow a kiss like that. But nothing happened. What I'd hoped was the beginning of a crazy, fairytale ending was nothing more than momentary respite from their loneliness, the only thing, other than me, that they really shared. I felt disappointed and foolish and very, very young.

I never knew what tore their marriage apart. I never understood why they couldn't move on and, after that kiss, I stopped trying to guess. Grown ups were strange. Life went on.

Until Renee's bombshell two months ago. _How __would __you __feel __if __we __went __to __live __with __your __father __in __Forks?_

Not even a week has passed since we arrived in Forks and already my old life in Phoenix feels as though it happened to someone else, to someone older and more serious. There are things I miss, people mostly, but any pangs of loneliness are easily outweighed by the exhilarating freedom that my mother's happiness brings.

Those days when the curtains were drawn and our house creaked in the silence are over. And more than that, the weight of expectation, unspoken and maybe only existing in my own mind, that I'd go to College in Arizona, that I'd stay in Phoenix forever, has been lifted. How could I ever have left her alone with only those bright colors on canvas to protect her?

But things have changed. We're here now.

This bedroom is filled with reminders of my old life. My new bed is the only thing that wasn't brought in the truck from Phoenix. My desk and lamp, my nightstand with the flea market Tiffany lamp, the charcoal drawing of the wolf, drawn long ago by Renee, hangs on the wall. Even the walls are the same blue as my old room. If I squint, it's almost as though I haven't been anywhere at all. I wonder if Charlie would let me paint the walls.

I throw my bedspread off and go downstairs to the front porch.

Behind me is the road that brought me here, to this place, a road scarred with potholes and dead-end detours, strewn with the wreckage of my parents' heartbreak. Ahead of me the path is wide open, glinting and shining with freedom and possibility. The door between is open. All I need to do is walk through it.

My new truck sits on the drive. Seen through the pouring rain, it's a red smudge against a green haze of trees. A pale golden sun peeks weakly through purple clouds and a rare patch of blue sky bravely bursts through in the distance.

I step off the porch, stretching my arms out wide as the rain drips through my fingers, stinging my face and dancing on my tongue. I breathe in deeply.

There's color everywhere, but there is not a scrap of silver to be seen. Today is even better than that.

It's a rainbow.

~~~ O ~~~

I've met Billy Black before. He came to Phoenix with Charlie last summer and, even though he only stayed for two days, it feels good to see a familiar face. Renee falls into his arms as we walk through Billy's front door, while Charlie and I shuffle around for what feels like forever. No one seems to know what to say until Billy fixes his dark eyes on me.

"How's the truck?"

"It's great. I love it," I say. The faded red Chevy that Renee and Charlie gave me as a "Welcome to Forks" gift is parked outside Billy' house.

"It's running great," Charlie says. "You did a good job on it, Jake."

Billy's tall, dark, son is standing in the doorway, his boyish face somehow too young for the serious eyes that look back at me. His beautiful friend, Emily, with her smiling, open face looks like a doll next to him.

"Come on, Bella, we'll show you around the Rez," Emily says.

My mother is a good photographer, her talent for color and composition not limited to fabrics and canvas. The corkboard in her bedroom in Phoenix was covered with faded images of the ocean and the mountains, the river and the forest that surround the Quileute Reservation. I can't wait to see it all for myself.

We drive around in Jake's old car, his huge frame hunched over the steering wheel as they show me the beaches, the harbor and the fishing boats. It's a beautiful place, with green mountains descending into the sea and the unfamiliar scent of brine and fir trees on the wind. We stop so I can collect driftwood at First Beach and then again at a little grocery store near the harbor.

"We'll cook at your place, Em," Jake says, as we leave the shop with enough food to feed us all for dinner. "Leave the grown ups to reminisce."

A group of young boys greet him shyly as we get into the car. They grin and duck their heads when he responds, hiding pleased smiles, and I wonder if this is what Charlie was like as a teenager, if losing a parent so young gave him the same self assurance that Jake has.

We pull up at Emily's house, a small clapboard shack away from the main settlement, with a wide verandah out the front. There's a well lit living room just inside the front door with rolls of denim fabric piled up against the wall and a group of old ladies sitting on wooden chairs, hunched into their shawls as their gnarled hands stitch away. At first they don't notice me standing behind Jake, but when he steps aside seven pairs of dark, curious eyes stare straight back at me.

"Isabella Swan," one of them whispers and a low hum passes between them, their eyes never leaving mine.

"I didn't think you'd be here today," Emily says, glancing nervously at Jake.

"It's no problem," he says, turning to me. "Bella, this is Emily's great-grandmother and her sewing circle". He introduces them and I shake their hands one by one until I get to the last. She takes my hand firmly and pulls me in close, until my face is only inches from hers.

"You are Quileute in your blood, Isabella Swan," she says, her eyes blazing. "You are Quileute in your blood, just like your father, Isabella Swan, just like your grandfather."

I glance around the room at the other old women. They're all staring at me with the same bright eyes, as though I am something other than I am, something more than just me.

"You will save our sons, Isabella Swan," she says, and there are tears in her eyes as she finally releases my hand.

The room is silent for a moment as the old woman sits back, and then she closes her eyes and begins to sing a high keening song in a language I don't understand. The other women join her one by one until the room feels too small and I turn to Jake, embarrassed and confused. He puts two hands on my shoulders, leans in and whispers "old and crazy" with a quiet laugh. I want to believe him but I catch the look of panic that passes from Emily to him as we leave the room.

"What was that all about?" I ask as we reach the kitchen.

Jake pulls a bag of fish out of the fridge and shrugs. "Like I said, old and crazy," he says, as the voices fade in the other room. "Her son died years ago and she's never gotten over it. She says that stuff to everybody she meets."

"But she knew my name, my full name, and what about the other women?" I say. "The way they were looking at me -."

I'm cut short by the sudden clatter of pots and pans falling out of a cupboard at Emily's feet. As we pick them up she says, smiling, "Do you cook, Bella?", and I do, so we prepare the food together to take back to Billy's house. They pepper me with questions about school, Phoenix, anything until the food is ready and we leave.

There's no one in the front room as we pass, just the bolts of denim in the gloom and half finished sewing strewn across the chairs.

We eat dinner together at Billy's and it goes on all night. Every time I open my mouth to speak someone has a story to tell, something to say. It feels deliberate, but that makes no sense, and then the night is over and we're home again, before I get a chance to ask about what happened in that room.

I sit on my bed, curtains open to the night, running my fingers over the smooth driftwood from First Beach as it throws shadows, like charcoal on paper, onto the walls. Long ago I found a drawing Renee had done and hidden away between the pages of a book. There were two long-haired figures, their heads bowed over dark cloth as they stitched together. There were words scrawled on the page, _Swan __& __Clearwater_, and a small stain underneath them, puckered and blue around the edges, as though tears had fallen there and been left to dry. I hid the picture back in the book and never asked Renee what it meant.

It's so still tonight, so still and so quiet. If I close my eyes I can hear the old woman's words as her voice rises in song, as clearly as if she is in this room with me. But it makes no difference how clear the song or how long I listen. The meaning of it all remains lost to me.

~ O ~

Thanks so much for reading! x


	3. Chapter 3

Liz (lizf22) & Annette (annetteinoz) spend a bunch of time pre-reading and beta-ing (not a word?) this and I think they're both wonderful.

Disclaimer: Stephenie Meyer owns them.

Thanks for reading!

~~~ Charlie ~~~~

I've driven this route thousands of times before. A right turn out of the station, through two set of lights, left and left again, and then a right onto my street. Eight minutes from the station to my doorstep if I get the lights.

It's never seemed like a long drive before, but these days it feels endless.

I pull up at the first set of lights, their red glow reflected a dozen watery times on the rain-soaked road.

The nightmare returned last night. That flash of red, iridescent in the darkness, darting through the black trees and I woke, trembling. But this time, Renee was there. She whispered in my ear, a sound as soothing as the rush of water over pebbles, speaking a language I barely understand.

She painted a picture with her words of the summer to come, of a season with white clouds over cool green water, silver fish shimmering on the end of my line, golden beer glowing in the afternoon light, and the brown of our daughter's eyes. She spoke to me in every color but the one that haunts me, and when she was done, I believed it might be possible.

A car horn blares behind me. The traffic light is green and I raise a hand in apology, accelerating slowly. The car zooms past, its stony-faced driver staring straight ahead. The people of Forks are baffled by the sudden and unannounced return of my wife and daughter. Their confusion is manifested in the form of anger, and that anger is directed at me.

Bella is a curiosity to them. Just a baby when she was taken from Forks, half remembered, if at all, they're eager to make her feel welcome. School has begun and, as the days go by, the phone rings less frequently with her friends from Phoenix, and more often with kids from Forks High.

They're not so welcoming of Renee. Judgements were made about her long ago, and the people of Forks have long memories, but she charms their wariness away with her warmth and ease and, before long, they're remembering how much they used to like her.

They're less forgiving of me. They look at me in the street as though I'm someone new to town, a stranger they're determined not to like. Whispers crawl up my back as I pass by. I've taken them by surprise, and they view me now through eyes narrowed with suspicion. I'm not who they thought I was.

I turn onto my street, the front of my house just visible in the distance. It looks so calm and orderly from the outside, but I know differently.

Piles of books lean precariously against the walls in the living room, too numerous to find a home in my single bookcase. Tubes of paint and screens with fabric stretched across them will have to be cleared from the kitchen table before we sit down for dinner. Renee's clothes spill from suitcases in our bedroom and the bathroom shelves are cluttered with pots of cream and colored tubes. Renee might be in the kitchen now, with pans clattering and dinner sizzling, the radio blaring. Bella is probably at her desk upstairs, knocking her books to the floor as she rushes to answer the phone.

My quiet, peaceful house has been turned into a three ring circus.

I've never been happier.

My cell phone buzzes as I turn into the drive. That dreamlike summer that Renee calmed me with last night isn't here yet, and I'm jolted back to the cold reality of this grey January afternoon.

Beneath the happiness is always - _always_ - the fear. There is no explanation for why those demons stopped haunting the forest, no reason we know of for this mysterious, miraculous four years of peace. At any time they could return and there's not a single thing I can do about it.

There is plenty, however, that can be done about Harry Clearwater.

I toss the phone onto the passenger seat, the screen glowing green, like something poisonous in the shadows.

_"We __need __to __talk," _the message says.

He's right. We do.

~~~ O ~~~

Renee sits cross legged on the floor of our bedroom, pulling clothes from a suitcase and folding them into piles on the floor. She's oblivious to me as I lean against the doorframe, watching her. Her long, dark hair hangs loose, tucked behind her ears. I feel hollow-chested at the expression on her face, that contemplative, faraway look in her eyes, the faint lines of concentration shadowing her forehead, the tilt of her head.

I'd forgotten that look.

The handful of summer days I spent in Phoenix every year were divided into two distinct parts. The daylight hours were for Bella. Carefully chosen, generic words were all that passed between Renee and I, the polite distances between us controlled and deliberate.

Bella was our focus, but the constant monitoring of our behaviour was the lens through which everything was viewed. We mustn't slip up. We mustn't drop our guard. We couldn't risk Bella catching a glimpse of the firestorm raging beneath the disinterested façade.

The nights though, the nights were ours. That fleeting refuge between nightfall and dawn, a burrow in the darkness that we crawled into, clandestine and guilty.

Renee never painted while I was in Phoenix. The strain of days overshadowed by deceit, and nights where the flavor of our love was tainted by guilt left no space for creative urges.

She told me once what it felt like when inspiration struck and I know, looking at her now, what's happening on the inside. She no longer sees the scrap of material in her hands as an ordinary cotton t-shirt. It has become something else to her, the beginning of something, a color, a shape, a texture, an idea, a spark looking for a place to burn.

She looks very young sitting on my bedroom floor, young and happy and _awake_. The last time I saw that look on her face was when she was pregnant with Bella. I swallow a sigh, wanting this moment to last a little longer, trying to imprint this snapshot of my wife in my memory forever, so it's never lost again.

When will the grieving end? When will I be able to look at my life in a moment like this and not feel the loss of all that we've missed? These feelings seem to charge at me from nowhere, lunging like slavering beasts from the deep, snapping and clawing at my throat.

_You __won't __be __allowed __to __keep __this_, they hiss. _This __is __not __yours __to __keep_.

The sigh escapes, the sound pulling us back together from our solitary worlds, and Renee looks up, a smile lighting her face. I pull her into my arms and bury my face in her hair, breathing her in.

"It's time to get started on your studio," I say.

"I still can't believe I'm really going to have one. It seems too good to be true."

"I'll call Sam tomorrow. We can mark it out in the yard, draw up some plans."

"That reminds me, Harry Clearwater phoned just now," she says. I sit on the bed, kicking my boots off. Renee sits beside me, the faded, green t-shirt still in her hands.

"He sent a message to my cell too. He wants to talk."

"Not to me," she says.

"He's not used to you being around. Give him time."

"He didn't sound like he has much time," she says, leaning into me. "He's what? Fifty-five or so?"

"A little younger, fifty-three I think."

"He sounded like an old man, Charlie." She lifts her head from my shoulder and looks into my face, searching my eyes. "It's begun, hasn't it? The Rising?" I nod.

"Poor Sue," she says, "poor Leah. They've been through enough already."

Tragedy and heartbreak have haunted the Clearwater family for years. Harry's brother died a martyr's death trying to save my father that night in the meadow, twenty-three years ago. The Quileute view his death as the ultimate act of bravery, but whichever way you look at it, a dead hero is still dead. Harry's family have never really recovered.

There followed years of heartache as Harry and Sue tried, and failed, to conceive. Harry's desperation to continue the Clearwater bloodline, to ensure that the next Chief of the Quileute was his son, added one more layer to the hard shell he lives under. When Leah was finally born, a miracle baby, I'm sure Harry hoped they'd have another, a son, but Leah remained an only child.

And now this final, inevitable, tragedy.

"How much time do you think he has?" Renee asks.

"It's hard to say. It could be months or it could be any time."

"So sad," she murmurs, "it's so sad but, Charlie, we can't let that influence what we do. We have to be firm with him."

"He won't let up on Bella, you know," I say. "He wants everything settled before it's too late."

"Well, so do we, just not in the same way he does."

"Where is Bella?" I ask.

"Don't panic," she says, "but she's gone for a walk in the forest."

I'm out of the room and halfway down the stairs, a steady flow of profanity spewing from my mouth when Renee catches up with me. I wheel on her, wild-eyed with panic. Her mouth is moving but her words don't penetrate this paralysing isolation. I'm trapped inside my head, watching as the flash of red circles my daughter, flickering and darting through the trees, closer and closer until finally – _finally_- Renee's voice breaks through.

"It's alright, Charlie, she's safe. You know the pack is watching her all the time. I phoned Billy as soon as she left and he made sure they know she's out there. They're watching her, Charlie, she'll be alright," she says, stroking my cheek with the back of her hand. "I told her to stay on the trail and to be back well before dark. It's been four years, Charlie, four years. There's nothing in the woods. The pack is watching her. She's safe."

My limbs feel hollow and I sit weakly on the stairs as the adrenaline fades, so tired I can't stand.

"Bella will be OK. It will all be OK. We'll talk to Harry. We'll work it all out together and then we'll just live, you know, like we've never been able to do. We will, Charlie."

Her conviction is absolute, her belief that we will have this time together so strong that I can do nothing but sit with her on the stairs, staring at the front door, waiting for our daughter to come home.

~~~ O ~~~

There is a particular odor that's become familiar to me over the years, the musty scent of age and decay, undercut by the sharp smell of antiseptic. It hit me as soon as I walked in the door, the air cloying and dense, heavy and hard to breathe. Renee sits next to me on the couch in Harry Clearwater's living room, her hand at her mouth, struggling with the smell and with the shock of seeing a man in his fifties looking like this.

Once barrel-chested and vital, with his proud, noble profile and long dark hair, his upright carriage and bright eyes, he was the quintessential Quileute. He seemed bulletproof and, even though we knew it was coming, it's always been hard to believe that Harry would succumb.

Yet here he sits, a scrap in the chair, wizened and withered.

Harry and I have been at odds for years, coming at everything from opposite directions. In his mind, Bella should have been brought back years ago, she should never have been sent away in the first place. And the cold, clinical approach he takes to leading this tribe of strange, magical people is his way, but it's not mine.

But he was the one, all those years ago, who carefully unveiled the real world to me, in all its blood-stained horror, and somehow made it seem less frightening. It was he who led me through the forest to the meadow for the first time and taught me how to survive it, he who stood at my side until Billy was ready to, protecting me.

It hurts to see him like this. I reach over and take Renee's hand, squeezing it gently.

"I think we need to tell Isabella," he's saying, dabbing at his rheumy eyes with a tissue. "She needs to know. It's no good for her to live here for a year and a half, finish school and go off to College. What if we need her in a hurry?"

"I'm not planning on her being needed here for a long time," I say.

"I know you're doing all you can," he says, waving a gnarled hand dismissively. "I know that. You take your vitamins and go running and you have your medical check-ups but, Charlie, even healthy people die sometimes."

It's hard to look him in the eye when he says that. Just weeks ago, _he_ was healthy. The physical changes have been rapid and unrelenting, as they always are, but his eyes, though clouded, betray no hint of fear.

"And don't you think it'll be harder for her if she has a life all set up some place else. What if she marries some man from college who wants to drag her off miles away? She's going to have to uproot her life and come back here, Charlie." He, too, is relentless, his mind as sharp as it ever was, and part of me marvels at his persistence. "It's better if she just stays here, marries a local boy, a Quileute maybe, and has her family here."

I've heard all this so many times before. It was easier, though, to fight back when Bella wasn't here, vulnerable. Easier too when Harry was strong, before the Rising began. I'm having trouble finding the right words and when I speak, my voice rings thin and unconvincing in my ears.

"We'll leave, Harry. If you push things with Bella, we'll leave."

"You wouldn't do it, Charlie. What if they come back? You'd never leave us to fight alone."

"No," Renee says. "He probably wouldn't."

Harry sits back in his chair, a satisfied gleam in his faded eyes. Renee reaches up and tucks her hair behind her ears and looks him full in the face and, in a calm, cool voice, says, "But I would."

He makes a small sound, a snort of derision and I smile behind my hand. My wife is a gentle woman, kind-hearted and slow to anger. People who don't know her well sometimes mistake this gentleness for weakness.

Harry has misjudged her badly.

"Harry," she says, her words all the more powerful, delivered as they are in her measured, even voice. "Harry, if you or anyone else in this tribe makes the smallest hint to my daughter again, if you give her even the slightest reason to suspect anything, I will pack my family up and leave this place and you will never hear from us again. All of us, Harry, including Charlie. You shouldn't doubt me when I say this. You shouldn't test me out on this because I am telling you right now, we will be gone without word or explanation. My family has sacrificed enough."

He looks at her as though he's seeing her for the first time and when he reaches up to wipe his mouth, his hand trembles.

"I would like you, please, to have Jake try and explain things to Bella in a way that will make sense to her," she continues. "She's not stupid, Harry, and we didn't fool her the other night, not by a long way."

He doesn't speak, the only sound the ticking of the clock from another room, until finally I say, "Harry?"

A shudder runs through his shoulders and he shakes his head slightly, as though he's shaking off one idea and trying to come up with another. After a long moment he speaks not to me, but to Renee.

"Yes," he says. "I'll do that."

"Good," Renee says, with a satisfied nod. "Thank you, Harry."

Renee turns to him as we rise to leave. "One more thing," she says. "Bella will go to college wherever she chooses, she'll fall in love with whoever she chooses and no one, not me or Charlie, not even you, will have any say in it."

~~~ O ~~~

I rise at dawn to run, just like any other day. When I return, Renee is in the kitchen with music playing and the sleeves on her bathrobe rolled up. Delicious smells waft through the house, bacon and potato cakes and berries.

"I can't believe you still have that bathrobe." It's a dozen different shades of blue with silver and white cranes on it and it trails around her legs when she twirls, spatula in hand, laughing.

"My twenty-fifth birthday," she says. "Do you remember?"

I remember. I bought it in Port Angeles and mailed it to her in Phoenix so it would arrive on the right day. Bella was four, and when I phoned Renee after work that day, she was laughing, telling me Bella insisted on unwrapping it herself. "It's from Daddy," she'd said and couldn't be convinced it wasn't for her. She slept in it that night, wrapped in the yards of fabric and it wasn't until I sent a mini version to Bella, that Renee was able to wear her birthday present.

"I made a cushion out of Bella's once she'd grown out of it," Renee says. "She still has it somewhere."

I take the spatula from Renee's hand and make her sit at the table while I finish cooking breakfast. When it's ready I call up the stairs for Bella and she stumbles in, her face creased with sleep.

"This kitchen smells _good._" she says, piling her plate high.

"So," Renee says, "what are we doing today?"

"Um?" Bella says. I've been 'Charlie' to her for years but since she came to Forks, she seems unsure what to call me. 'Um' seems to have become my new name.

"Bella," I say, looking at my plate. "'Charlie' is fine. 'Dad' is too, but only when it feels right." I glance up to see Bella staring at her plate too, her ears pink. "To you," I say. "Only if it feels right to you and if it never does, that's OK too." I reach over and take a piece of bacon from her plate. "It's just me, Bella, same as always."

"OK," she says. "OK." She laughs a little and glances quickly at me, taking a deep breath. "So...um, Charlie, I was wondering if it'd be OK if I painted my room?"

I don't try to explain my laughter to Renee and Bella. That night obsessing over Bella's room belongs in a chapter of my life that seems to be finished with now, and I leave it there. Instead I nod and after breakfast we go to the hardware in Bella's truck, buying paint and brushes.

We clear her room out and work all day and by late afternoon, her room is transformed by two coats of "Tangerine Tango", mixed and toned down by Renee into a soft orange, as mellow as a Forks sunset. Renee and Bella hang twinkle lights above Bella's bed and I stand in the doorway, paint splattered and content, as Bella puts the finishing touch, the cushion with the silver and white cranes on it, on her bed.

Renee joins me in the doorway and Bella kisses her cheek and then leans in quickly and kisses mine too, mumbling "thanks, Dad". I turn away quickly, before she sees my eyes.

I walk down the hall, a little unsteady on my feet, and splash some water on my face in the bathroom. When I look in the mirror, a face I barely recognise looks back at me. This man, the man in the mirror, looks much younger than me, smiling shyly as his eyes widen with surprise.

I give him a wink and he grins back at me, and I go downstairs to see what my family is doing.

~ O ~

Thanks so much for reading!


	4. Chapter 4

Thanks as always to Liz and Annette (this chapter is un-Annetted so I apologise for everything that may be wrong with it).

Disclaimer: Stephenie Meyer owns them.

There is no drug use in this story, jsyk.

~~~ Bella ~~~

First Beach seemed wild and untamed by day, but by moonlight it's a different world again. Serene in the half light, it's as though someone has taken this stretch of coastline and cast a spell on it. A silver crescent of sand gleams in the moonlight, the water beyond it a contrast of rolling black ink, bubbling into white foam as it rushes to the shore. The whisper of a cool breeze over the beach stirs the trees at my back to soft chatter, as the blue and lavender flames of the fire twirl like dancers, reaching for the stars.

Even the four figures sitting around the fire seem mysterious and enigmatic now that night has fallen. Maybe I do too.

I move closer to the fire, warming my hands.

"Warm enough, Bella?" Mike asks.

"Yeah, thanks," I reply. "I've never seen a driftwood fire before. It's so beautiful."

"Just don't tell anyone," he says. "We shouldn't really be doing this but we wanted to show you."

"Oh? Why shouldn't we be doing it?"

"The driftwood," Ben says. "The Quileute get touchy about it. Don't burn it, don't remove it."

"We thought we'd risk it tonight," Mike says. "I'm glad you like it."

"Is that tribal law?" I ask, thinking of the smooth, white driftwood Emily and Jake insisted I take with me from this beach.

"It's both. If your father or my uncle came here now we'd be in just as much trouble as if the Quileute caught us," Mike says with a wink.

"He works with my Dad, doesn't he? Your uncle?"

"Yeah, Dave Newton. He's a deputy now; he's worked his way up. Who knows, he might even be Chief when your father leaves."

"When my Dad leaves?"

"Well, that's the rumor." His tone is offhand but I'm wary. It's not the first time this week he's brought up the subject of my parents.

"It's probably just talk, but the word is that once you go to college, your Mom and Dad will leave Forks. You know, because of your Mom hating it here so much." He pauses. "I mean, that's why she left in the first place, isn't it?"

"I don't really know, Mike, but I don't think they plan on leaving."

"Oh really? Because I heard -."

Angela interrupts him.

"My legs are numb from sitting," she says, brushing the sand from her hands before holding them out to Ben. "Who's up for a walk?"

They rise one by one, stretching their limbs, but I stay where I am, longing for solitude by the firelight. They walk slowly, two pairs hand in hand, drifting north to the cliffs where the Quileute were diving at sunset. It frightened me when I saw the first figure jump from that great height, but Mike assured me they do it all the time. I thought I saw Jake amongst them, but in the gathering twilight I couldn't tell for sure.

Clouds drift in from the horizon now, the golden trail of moonlight on the ocean leading them slowly onto the beach. The shadows deepen briefly as the moon disappears and a shiver runs down my back. I pick up a stick and poke at the fire, sending a cascade of sparks hissing and fizzing into the sky, burning bright for an instant, and then gone.

I thought too, for a long time, that Renee left because of Forks, that maybe the weather and the town were both too much and not enough for her, but I see now that was never the reason.

She has immortalized this place a hundred times over the years in her fabrics and paintings. There were echoes of the soft shapes and muted colors of this landscape everywhere, and those seemingly random choices of hue and form now seem loaded and wistful. I think now that Arizona was a kind of exile for her, not an escape.

I kick my boots off and stretch my legs out, curling my toes near the fire, the warmth delicious and decadent against my skin. I lay back, not caring that my hair will be full of sand, looking up at the cloud scattered sky. The stars are brighter here than in Phoenix with no city lights to dull them, and my old home feels a long way away. It's surprising to me how little I've thought about that place since I came here, but my mind drifts back there tonight.

On my last day at school in Phoenix, a small, terracotta pot with a cactus planted in it was left on my locker. There was a scrap of paper, grubby and frayed, taped on the front of the pot, with scrawled words in red ink.

_I wish you'd looked at me when I looked at you._

I knew who it was from.

There was a shy boy in my English class who stole furtive looks at me when he thought I wasn't looking. I wanted to return those looks, to see what eyes filled with longing and promise looked like, but I didn't.

My mother and father taught me, without ever saying a word, that love is a frightening thing, a thing not ever recovered from when it ends.

I brought that cactus with me to Forks in the little terracotta pot. I brought it with me as a reminder that love is fierce and fearsome but, maybe, in the end, worth the fight and worth the risk. I brought it with me to remind myself to be brave.

I stretch out beneath the stars, my fingers twisting in my tangled, sandy hair.

_I__'__m __ready, _I whisper to the sky above. _I__'__m __ready __now. __I__'__m __not __afraid __anymore._

Next time, I won't look away.

~~~ O ~~~

I hear a soft footfall behind me in the sand.

A flash of eyes and teeth in the darkness as I sit up and turn.

A deep voice.

"Hi Bella," Jake says. "It's only me."

"Jake, you scared me." My hands tremble a little as I shake the sand out of my hair. "What are you doing out here all alone?"

"Just walking," he says, sitting next to me on the sand. "That's a pretty fire you have there."

"It's beautiful - but illegal, I'm told. Are we in trouble?"

"Nah, it's OK. Just don't let Billy catch you," he teases.

"Does he know you're out here on your own in the middle of the night?"

"Sure," he says. "I come out here all the time. Not always alone though."

His soft laughter is mellow and warm, and I laugh too. Jake is easy company, relaxed and self assured, and I'm glad he's wandered along.

"How _is_ Emily?" I ask.

"She's great", he says, stabbing at the fire until it collapses on itself a little, the red embers glowing brightly in the sand. "Walk with me?"

We don't speak for a while. The only the sounds are the gentle waves and the soft squeaking of the sand beneath our bare feet, as we follow the curve of the shoreline south towards the point. I want to ask him again about those ladies at Emily's house, my curiosity about them not satisfied, but he speaks first.

"How's school been?" he asks.

"Fine," I reply. "It's a lot smaller than my school back home, but I like it. The kids are nice. It's fine."

"Forks is a pretty good place to live, if you can handle the weather."

"Talk to me again in a year," I say, laughing. "Right now I love it but the novelty may have worn off by then."

"Well, if the weather doesn't scare you off maybe the strange old ladies will," he says.

"Yeah, that _was_ a little strange."

"I hope you haven't been worrying about it, Bella. She's just an eccentric old woman who thinks she sees things. I would have warned you, but I didn't know they were going to be there."

"It's OK. I haven't really thought about it," I lie. "It was weird how they all knew my name though, my full name."

"Not really," he says. "Charlie was pretty excited about you coming back, you know. Just about everyone in the Pacific Northwest knew you were coming home long before you arrived."

"Really?"

"Sure," Jake says. "You know, I snuck off and phoned my Dad while we were still at Emily's that day. I think we all did a lousy job of distracting you. We were worried those old ladies had upset you."

"Oh?" I say. "Well, that explains a lot."

"So you _have_ been thinking about it," he says.

"Well, maybe a little," I reply. "Jake, are you OK?" There's something odd in his tone. It's as though these are lines he's rehearsed for a play and he delivers them in a strange, flat tone, not at all like his usual smiling enthusiasm.

"Sure, I'm fine. Why?"

"I don't know, you just sound a little -." I trail off, not knowing what to say without sounding rude.

"I'm fine, Bella." He sounds a little frustrated, so I let it go. "You'll probably hear a lot of stuff about us, Bella, about my tribe. Maybe you've heard things already?"

"No, not really," I say, shaking my head.

"Well, you will. There are some crazy stories about us. Old Quileute legends that have somehow been mixed in with our modern day way of life," he says. "Sometimes people don't understand us, so they make things up. Come and see me if you're confused. I'll tell you anything you want to know."

"OK," I say. "Thanks Jake, I will."

We talk about other things and Jake seems more like himself. By the time we get back to the fire the others have returned from their wandering. They seem uncomfortable with Jake, maybe because of the fire, and the talk is awkward and stilted. He doesn't stay for long, just a few minutes before he gets up to walk home. No one offers him a ride and I wish I'd come in my truck, instead of with Angela and Ben, so I could take him home. I don't like the thought of him alone in the forest at night, but he laughs when I mention it.

"Don't worry about me, Bella," he says. "I'm Quileute. I know this land like the back of my hand."

He heads off toward the forest, turning once before he reaches the black line of trees.

"Maybe put that fire out, Newton," he says. "There's plenty of wood in the forest that's not illegal to burn."

~~~ O ~~~

"Jesus," Mike says, once Jake is out of earshot. "They act like they own the place."

There's a moment of silence, followed by snickers and quiet laughter. I can almost see Mike's face glowing red, even in the darkness.

"Come on, you know what I mean," Mike says. "They're like that in town too, strutting around all puffed up, like we owe them something."

"They _are_ creepy," Jessica says.

"Creepy?" I ask.

"Really creepy," she replies. "All kinds of weird stuff happen to the Quileute."

"Like what?"

"Well, for a start they grow really, really big. They hit fourteen and turn into these hulking giants from nowhere and they get married and have babies really young, barely out of high school. Then when they're middle aged, they get really old suddenly." She shakes her head and shudders lightly. "Creepy."

I look from face to face around the fire, wait for more snickering or a hidden smile, but all I see are serious faces.

"Well, not _all_ of them, Jess," Angela says.

"Well, some of them."

"You're kidding, right?" I say.

Ben shakes his head. "Nope. It's some kind of accelerated ageing syndrome. The men - _some_ of the men - age more quickly than normal. It begins when they reach adolescence. Physically they develop in a very short span of time and then they're fine until they reach their fifties, and then it happens again. They become old men almost overnight."

"It's really weird," Jessica says. "People come out here sometimes, doctors, trying to figure it out, studying them, and the Quileute refuse to cooperate." She turns to Angela. "Remember when that film crew from National Geographic came out here?" She looks at me. "Not one of the Quileute would even speak to them."

"But don't the Quileute want to find out why? Who would want to live for years as an old man?" I feel foolish even participating in this conversation. Of course it's some kind of prank, a rite of passage for the cop's daughter before I'm really accepted into their crowd. Any minute now one of them will break, a snicker will escape and they'll all dissolve into laughter, but Ben just shakes his head, the firelight flickering on his face.

"They don't live for years, Bella."

"I don't understand. I thought you said they were only in their fifties when this happens."

"I did. They are. That's how old they are in years, Bella, but their bodies have aged. Physically, they're old men."

I shake my head, laughing a little. "Come on, guys. There's no way this happens." This must be what Jake warned me about. Stories invented by people about a culture they don't understand and have no interest in understanding.

"The Quileute call it the Rising." Angels says, quietly.

"The Rising?"

"Rising to the Top of the Rock," she says. "Out there." She looks toward the ocean. "James Island. The Quileute call it 'A-Ka-Lat'. 'The Top of the Rock'. According to their legends, it's where the Quileute Chiefs were buried, and other people too, important tribes people. Some say that it's still done, that these men are buried out there." She turns back to me, her eyes wide and earnest in the dim light. "They don't survive for more than a few months once the ageing, the Rising, begins." She pauses for a long moment. "Bella, they die."

The cool breeze drops for a long moment, as though the Quileute lands have stilled to listen, breathless, to these improbable tales. I look out over the black ocean to the huge rock that rises from the water, majestic and noble like a king, the sheer cliffs topped with a crown of trees.

It's easy to imagine the ancient Quileute warriors pushing their canoes into the water, following the trail of moonlight to the Island to bury their fallen. I imagine Jake, his long hair flying against the ocean wind, paddling his canoe through waves that have long since washed ashore, to the calm water beyond.

"Jake," I gasp, as it hits me. "Jake?"

I remind myself, as Angela replies, that none of this is real, but the dread washes over me like a tidal wave anyway.

"Yes," Angela whispers. "Jake."

~~~ O ~~~

Renee is in the backyard handing steaming mugs of coffee to three men I don't recognise, their breath billowing in gusts in the cold, afternoon light. Piles of lumber and bags of cement are stacked neatly by the porch, and the string lines Renee and Charlie measured out yesterday march in straight lines and right angles on the grass.

Renee laughs at something the men say, her long, delicate fingers dancing in the crisp air as she replies. I look a lot like my father, brown eyed and fair skinned, but I have my mother's hands.

I put my school bag down on the porch, frustrated that Renee isn't alone. I want to talk to her about those crazy stories shared around the fire last night, but there was no time before school. She waves me over, stomping her feet on the grass to keep warm, smiling broadly.

"Hi, Bella," she says. "How was school?"

"Good," I reply.

"This is Sam Uley," she says, gesturing to the man beside her.

He holds his hand out, engulfing mine in a surprisingly gentle grip, and I look up, way up, to meet his dark eyes. He has a lovely face, handsome and very young, and the frame it rests upon is enormous. A shiver of unease crawls up my spine.

I reach out to shake another hand and something catches my eye, a quick flash in the sunlight.

There is a wedding ring on Sam Uley's left hand.

"Thanks for the crib," he says, smiling.

"Crib?" I say. My voice sounds too high and I take a deep breath and hold it for a moment, trying to calm down.

"Charlie gave your old crib to Sam when he was getting your room ready," Renee says. "You don't mind, do you?"

"No, of course not. I didn't know I still _had_ a crib. You have a baby coming?"

"I do," Sam says. "Leah's due in a few months. We can't wait."

Renee asks him about due dates while the other men begin unpacking tools from their truck. They look older than Sam, mid twenties maybe, and they are unremarkable in every way. Average height, average size, no wedding rings.

"How old is he?" I ask Renee quietly, as Sam joins the other men.

He must have sharp hearing though, because he smiles at me over his shoulder.

"I'm nineteen," he says, "but I'm a hot-blooded Quileute, Isabella Swan. Why wait?"

~~~ O ~~~

A gentle wind blows the branch outside my window against the glass, scratching like a hand in the dark trying to claw its way in. It's just one more thing keeping me awake.

When I asked Renee and Charlie about the Quileute over dinner, they laughed. "Is that old story still around?" Renee launched into a long lecture on the need for respect and understanding of cultural differences and how the health system has failed indigenous people more thoroughly than it's failed anyone else. She sounded convincing enough, but I noticed that Charlie stopped eating after I brought the subject up, pushing food around his plate and not really listening to Renee.

After dinner I picked the phone up in my room to call Jake, and Charlie's voice was already on the line. "Just be ready," he was saying, and a voice, maybe Billy's, replied, "We know, we're ready."

I hung up quietly and thought again about phoning Jake. How exactly would this conversation go? "Hey Jake, the kids at Forks High tell me you're going to die young. Are you?"

I didn't phone him.

I give up on sleep, taking my book to the window seat where I sit, staring at blurred words, before giving up on that too. I glance over at my bed. My laptop is under there. I could do a search in no time but I know, without looking, exactly what I'd find. A Wiki page written by who knows who that will provide a reasonable summary and then question the existence of such an improbable thing. After that will be listed page after page of compelling evidence, equally compelling counter-arguments, conspiracy theories and wild conjecture. What I won't find is concrete, irrefutable facts.

It's hopeless.

My distress on the beach was genuine and telling myself that these stories were nothing more than that – stories – didn't really help in that moment. Angela looked guilty and rubbed my shoulder, laughing a little. "God, Bella, it's probably all rubbish. I mean, they have all these other stories too, things like the Quileute being descended from wolves and the forest being full of vampires and all kinds of crazy stuff."

"Ridiculous," I whisper. "Enough. Enough of this." I march over to my bed, climb in, turn off the lamp, close my eyes tightly, and it begins again. Immediately images flash before my eyes, images of Jake and the old ladies and James Island and those earnest faces around the fire.

_The old ladies._

The book Renee had left her drawing in, the drawing of the two old women - _Swan __and __Clearwater_ - was a book on the Quileute, I'm sure of it. The covers are thrown off and I'm tiptoeing down the stairs in a heartbeat, hoping I'll be able to find the book amongst the piles in the living room without waking Renee and Charlie.

I hesitate on the bottom stair, listening. There's soft music coming from the kitchen.

I recognise the song. A soft brush of drumbeat under a wistful slide guitar, a thin, reedy voice and a gorgeous harmony. This is the song Renee listened to on the bad days. I creep closer to the kitchen, worried I'll find Renee hunched in a chair, lost in whatever sad, faraway place that song always took her to, but she's not alone and she's not hunched in a chair.

She's in Charlie's arms and they're dancing in a rhythm slower than the beat of the music, their feet barely moving. It feels wrong to be watching them, but they're mesmerising and I don't look away.

Charlie opens his eyes, a lazy smile under his moustache and takes a step back and now they're far apart, their outstretched arms luminous in the moonlight, their fingers barely touching. Renee twirls slowly until she's back in his arms.

I gasp and duck back behind the wall, holding my breath until I'm safely back in my bedroom. The room is spinning and tilting at odd angles and I slide down the door, hugging my knees, breathing hard.

Images of Charlie in Phoenix flip through my head. Year after year, summer after summer, Charlie in the hot Arizona sun, crimson-faced, sweltering in the wrong clothes, long sleeves pulled to his wrists.

And other things flood my mind. How Charlie could never stay with us for more than a few days, always rushing back to Forks, how once or twice he cut short his stay unexpectedly.

The puzzle pieces click into place and the mystery is solved. All the "why's" I've ever had answered in one moment. I have never seen my father's bare arms before, I'm certain of it, but when the moon shone full on his skin, there they were, plain and unmistakable.

I see now what my mother ran from. I see why my father kept his life in Forks hidden, separate from me. It is all as clear as the faded scars, the needle marks, running up and down my father's arms.

~O~

Thank you so much for reading!


	5. Chapter 5

Thank you, as always, to my beautiful friends Liz and Annette (who sorted this chapter out while sick and on holiday with her family!). They're both wonderful to give up their time for this little bit of fun.

**Just to reiterate, there is no past or present drug use in this story.**

Disclaimer: Stephenie Meyer owns them.

~~~ Charlie ~~~

When the blow falls, I barely flinch.

It has been coming for days, building like black thunderheads in the distance, closing in and pressing down.

It began with a phone call from Leah Uley, her words tumbling out in a nervous rush. Sam and his team had been called away to another job, she said. They wouldn't be available to begin building Renee's studio for a few days.

"No," she said, "you can't speak to him. Sam isn't here right now."

He wasn't there when I phoned the next day.

Or the day after that.

I couldn't reach Billy or Jake either, and when I phoned Harry, Sue Clearwater told me, in a firmer voice than Leah had been able to manage, that Harry wasn't feeling well enough to come to the phone.

"I'll drive out there," I said to Renee. "See what's going on."

"No," she said, her eyes tight. "Don't. Let's wait and see."

She held my gaze, her eyes pleading, and the dread thundered harder in my chest with every moment of the silence that followed.

She knew.

She knew, just like I did, what it all meant. Sam, Billy, Jake and Harry; all four of them suddenly unavailable. It could mean only one thing.

The blood-hunters have returned.

~~~ O ~~~

Renee and I tiptoed around each other for days, not speaking of it, like two children cowering under a blanket as the storm gathers, hoping it will pass us by.

I want to scream and shout and rail at the moon. I want to burn the forest to the ground and dismantle the sky. But I don't. Outwardly I am as stoic as Renee, both of us clinging to the hope that there is some other reason behind the wall of silence from La Push.

But as the days pass with no word, the fear grows. That black smudge, always there but faded lately, almost to grey, grows dark again. It courses through my veins like poison. It settles in every nerve ending in my body. It's not going anywhere.

We watch every move Bella makes, outwardly calm while the bile rises in our throats every time she leaves the house. The Quileute will be there, hidden in the shadows, their protection unseen, never doubted but still, uselessly, we hover.

And Bella knows, of course she does, that something is wrong. We have dragged her under the shadow with us, her spirit dulled and thwarted. I notice, as the uneasy days wear on, that I am neither Charlie nor Dad to her anymore. She calls me nothing and when she looks at me, it's with narrow, guarded eyes.

On the third day, Renee says she will talk to Bella, to find out if something other than the heavy, bleak atmosphere in our house is troubling her. It's my turn, then, to plead.

"No," I say. "Leave her be."

Renee's questioning look slays me, meaning, as it does, that she hasn't yet given up all hope. I can't say the words. How can I possibly say the words? "We'll have to tell her something when you take her away, when you leave me again. Let her think, for whatever reason she conjures up, that it's our marriage that's falling apart. Let her, if she has to blame someone, blame me."

In the end there's no need to speak. Renee's face falls as my meaning sinks in. She turns from me and walks quietly upstairs and even though she closes the door, even though she has the water running, I can still hear her sobbing in the bathroom.

Hand in hand with my increasing certainty that the dream will soon be over, the nightmare intensifies. It assaults me nightly, more frightening than ever before. The red closes in on both of us now and Bella is there, bloodless with me on the forest floor. Even Renee's warm touch can't soothe the image away and when we make love, the joy is gone, replaced with something desperately, infinitely sadder.

So when Billy finally phones, I just close my eyes and let the storm break over me.

~~~ O ~~~

Billy pleads with me not to panic and I explain, in a voice so desolate it frightens me, that I'm not panicking. I'm planning. Bella will leave Forks as soon as it's safe for her to go, and Renee will go with her.

There's no question, no discussion, no alternative.

"Charlie," he says. "Charlie, stop. It's not what you think. Look, just come out here, OK?"

"How many are there?"

I push my chair away from the cluttered desk and close my office door. With the phone tucked under my chin, I fumble with the numbers on the smaller safe, the one that only I have the combination to.

"We'll talk when you get out here."

"Damn it, Billy." Finally I get the numbers right and the safe clicks open. The worn leather pouch is solid and familiar, but not comforting, in my hands. I unzip the cover, checking the contents. "What the hell's been going on out there?"

"Charlie, please, just trust me. Harry will explain everything."

I size up his tone, listening for that familiar, dreaded monotone. It's not there. I wonder briefly if Harry really is too frail to be in charge, but that doesn't feel right. Billy would have phoned me days ago if it was up to him, I'm sure of it.

"Alright, I'll be there," I say. "I'll get Bella from school and Renee from home and I'll be there. Just keep them away from town, Billy, keep them away from my daughter."

I zip up the satchel. It's all there, kept up to date and checked religiously by me every week, just in case. Antiseptic swabs, single use needles, vials; the tools of my trade.

"Look, Charlie, don't drag Bella out of school. There's no need to scare her, no need to create a situation that can't be explained away. They're in the mountains and they're not going anywhere. Bella's safe. You're both safe. Wait for an hour or two, wait till school finishes for the day and come out then, OK?"

"They," he said. Billy said "they". There's more than one, then. God, how I'd hoped to never set foot in that meadow again. The panic rises and oozes, trickling down the back of my neck, gathering on my palms.

_Please God,_ I whisper,_ don't let it be her. Don't let it be the one who killed my father, don't let it be the one who almost killed me._

~~~ O ~~~

I take a long moment to calm myself and when my breathing steadies, I call through the door for the officer on duty. He knocks and enters, eyebrows raised.

"Everything alright, Chief?" I grab my jacket and the leather pouch, hesitating at the door.

Something is off.

There was no sense of urgency in Billy's voice. All these years and so many phone calls, Billy's voice always frantic on the end of the line. "Get out here, _now_." Today his voice was calm and measured, as though there is no threat.

There's something else too. Jake has been on the patrols that range around Forks and La Push for two years now, even since he began to phase, but he's never fought in the meadow before. How can Billy sound so calm when his son is going to face the blood-hunters for the first time?

"Chief?"

I shake my head and square my shoulders, staring down the officer's questioning look.

"I'll be out at the Reservation for a while. Call Newton in until I get back."

"Something going on out there?"

"Nothing I can't handle," I mutter. "Just get him in here."

~~~ O ~~~

I gun the cruiser and eye the siren. I want to flick the switch and cut a wailing swathe through this town, collect my wife and daughter and just keep driving.

My God, this place and its clouds and rain and trees, its bleak, stifling half light.

This road I'm driving down, straight and familiar, joins with another, that road meeting in turn with another still; an asphalt river that snakes and forks all through this town, until it joins the highway to another town or disappears into the forest to another world.

If the people who live their lives on these quiet streets knew the truth, they'd run screaming from this town. We, the Quileute and I, protect the people of Forks from the deadly blood-hunters, but more than that, we keep these people innocent from the knowledge that they even exist.

And in the end, it's that, that makes me stay.

These people, and my daughter, will have their innocence.

Renee is standing at the living room window when I pull into the drive, her hand at the curtain and her face in the shadows, as though she's been waiting for me, as though she knew I was coming.

We don't speak. There are no words. She just takes my hand and leads me slowly upstairs, where the early afternoon quiet is barely disturbed by our grim, desperate love.

When there's no more time left and I can't hold the fear off any longer, Renee's tears fall like rain.

And it feels like goodbye, because it is.

~~~ O ~~~

Billy pours three fingers of scotch and hands us each a glass and even Renee, who doesn't drink, sips freely. Harry holds his glass up to the light with an unsteady hand and says quietly, "It's like liquid sunshine or honey." He shifts in his seat, wincing a little. "Golden," he says. "Something good."

My mind, strung out in a hundred different directions, can make no sense of this. At the forefront of everything is Bella.

She's with Emily at Billy's house, unaware of the drama unfolding around her. "Let's go out to La Push this afternoon," we said when we picked her up from school. She agreed wordlessly, her grave eyes a mirror image of my own.

Harry lowers the glass and leans forward, his eyes alight and intense.

"Their eyes, Charlie. Their eyes are the same color as this whisky." He leans back, a half smile pulling at his lined cheek. "They're not like the other ones."

"You've _seen_ them? You got close enough to see the color of their eyes?" I turn to Billy, incredulous, and he nods slowly.

"I've spoken to them," Harry says. His inexplicable, maddening calm is the catalyst for my incoherent thoughts to gather and focus.

"Harry," I say, "you have five minutes to tell me exactly what is going on before we pack up and leave forever." Slumped at my side, Renee slowly sips her drink, and Harry looks at her dispassionately before nodding at Billy.

"Billy was there. He'll tell you."

Harry leans his head back against the chair and closes his eyes, the whisky untouched in his glass. Billy pours himself another hit, clears his throat, and tells a tale so improbable if it wasn't Billy talking, I wouldn't believe it.

"They were picked up by the patrols four days ago, seven of them coming in from the south."

My stomach drops at his words. Seven. My God, _seven_. I grip Renee's hand harder as Billy continues.

"We were about to call you in, Charlie, we were, but then they pulled up and -." He wipes a hand over his mouth and glances at Harry, still reclined in the chair with his eyes closed. I'm not sure he's even awake until he mumbles, "Go on, Billy."

"They pulled up, just stopped dead in their tracks about fifty miles south-west."

"You let them get that close without telling me?" I'm on my feet, seething, my voice rising. I turn on Harry, his eyes half open now. "Jesus, Harry. There's seven of them and you let them get that close to Bella without me?" He shrugs. "Listen," is all he says, nodding in Billy's direction.

"They stopped, Charlie," Billy says. "We were hoping they'd turn back. We've never had seven at once before, never had more than three. We weren't sure we could handle that many."

I know all this. I've been there in that meadow every single time the blood-hunters have come for decades. Billy's stalling, and I don't know why until the next words come out of his mouth.

"They stayed there for around 14 hours and then -." He takes a sip of whisky and wipes his mouth again, his eyes rising to my chest, and going no further, as he says quietly "One of them phoned Harry."

My knees collapse and I sit weakly on the chair next to Renee.

"They…. phoned?" Renee says faintly. "How could they know -." She trails off, unable to finish the thought.

Sue walks in, pale and drawn, and takes the whisky from Harry, replaces it with a glass of water, and puts a small white pill in his hand. "Take this," she says, and walks out.

He sighs heavily, rolling the pill in his palm. "I told you, Charlie. These ones are different."

He puts the pill in his mouth, washes it down with the water, and looks at me.

"These ones don't hunt people. They survive on the blood of animals," he says, taking another sip of water. "They live like humans, Charlie."

"We've negotiated a treaty with them. They live like humans," he repeats, "and they're going to live here."

~~~O~~~

It's as though Harry Clearwater has announced that the world is flat and then, to prove it, offers to lead me to the edge so he can push me off.

"Charlie," he says, "I want you to meet them, to talk to them, but before you do I have some things to tell you." He settles back in his chair and looks me straight in the eye. "It's time you knew everything."

It is this that finally pulls Renee from her shocked stupor. She's on her feet, the whisky sloshing in her glass as she stands over Harry.

"Everything? _Everything?_ What else have you been hiding from us?" She turns to me, her face a picture of incredulous outrage. I shake my head slowly. I have no idea what's coming either.

"If you sit down, Renee, I'll tell you." His tone is mocking, patronising. His aged eyes are flinty.

I hadn't realised until now just how much Renee wounded his pride when she stood up to him that night. He is, it seems, about to make her pay.

"Two things," he says, holding up arthritic fingers. "There are two things you don't know."

"The first is something we didn't know either, something we had no way of knowing. All this time, for generations and generations, the chosen ones of our tribe have become wolves in adolescence. What we never knew is that it's the blood-hunters who are the trigger. When they stopped coming four years ago, not one of our boys began to phase."

"What are you talking about, Harry? There are plenty who've begun to phase since they stopped coming. Jake did, Seth, Paul. They've all triggered in the last four years."

I glance quickly at Billy. Has Harry lost his mind? Billy looks at the floor and a wave of uneasiness prickles my skin.

"No," Harry says, shaking his head. "They've all triggered in the last _two_ years. When the blood-hunters stopped coming, no one triggered."

I rise again on a surge of adrenaline, the horror of what he's about to say compelling my limbs to move, to act.

"Harry," I say, "Harry, you'd better not mean what I think you mean." Renee touches my hand and I turn to her mystified face.

Harry nods, slowly, his eyes steady. "The second thing we kept from you."

I hold a hand up in a useless, futile gesture, as though I can stop the words falling from his mouth with the force of my will.

"The red one," he says. "She's been back."

~~~ O ~~~

Harry explains it all to Renee, slowly and patiently, as though she is an idiot child. She doesn't stop him and neither do I. We both need to hear it said, to hear it spelled out in the simplest terms, so that the horror of what he's saying can permeate our clouded thoughts.

"The Quileute," he says, "have never known a time when the blood-hunters haven't haunted the forest. They have hunted in our lands for generations. You know how we've fought them off, our brave wolves against those cunning demons. You know how many of our tribesmen have fallen in the forest."

"There's no way we could have known that we needed them to trigger us to become what we are. Without the blood-hunters, we don't become wolves." He prods the air with a gnarled finger, driving the point home. "We need them."

"We were worried, Charlie, desperately worried. The future of our tribe and yours, of all the people of La Push and Forks, was at stake."

_Conundrum_. The word rolls around and around in my head as Harry pauses, giving us a moment to process what he's saying. The Quileute need the vampires to trigger the phase so that they, in turn, can kill the vampires.

I imagine, for a moment, a bright future, free of these supernatural creatures. No more vampires salivating for blood in the forest, no more Quileute dying young in their widow's arms.

And then I examine the other, darker and duller, side of the coin. This generation of Quileute, in time, die off, with no vampires to keep the young of the tribe phasing to replace them. The blood-hunters return and the Quileute begin to phase again.

It's not an easy thing, to kill a vampire, even with me around. It takes training and skill and experience and there would only be new wolves, too young and untried to have any of those things.

They'd be like lambs to the slaughter.

Renee sighs next to me and I meet Harry's questioning eyes with a nod. We understand.

"So then the red one came back, and when she did, Jake triggered." He looks tired now, his skin grey and his head bowed with fatigue.

Even with the ravages of this premature, merciless old age, he looks at this moment more like the man who took me under his wing all those years ago. Fatigue has stolen his arrogance, for now at least. I'm reminded that whatever he's done, right or wrong, he's done under a decades old cloud of grief for his brother, and to protect his people.

He sighs heavily. "She's been back since then," he says. "and we've managed to let her get close enough to La Push to trigger the phase, but not close enough to be a danger to anyone." He leans forward, urgent and intense. "Especially you, Charlie. You were never in any danger. Never."

I shake my head. "You know we would never have brought Bella back if we'd known, Harry."

There's no fire in my words. The time for anger has passed and I don't have the energy for it anyway. It is what it is. It's time now to deal with it.

Harry shrugs. "They're still out there, Charlie. We don't fool ourselves that we've killed them all and that's why they stopped coming. You knew they could come back any time."

"So" he says, leaning back, "there we are. We couldn't kill her. We needed her, but we knew it couldn't go on forever. Sooner or later she'd get one of us or she'd stop coming." And then he mumbles, almost to himself, "We don't even know why she keeps coming back."

My head snaps up. "You know why," I say. "You know, Harry. She killed my father. She nearly killed me." Renee takes my hand, squeezing my fingers so hard, it hurts. "You know why."

She's coming back for me."

~~~ O ~~~

Sue comes in, concern clouding her face. "Harry," she says, "you should rest now. You're exhausted." She clucks over him, fussing with the cushion at his back. "Please, Harry?"

"I'm fine," he says, shooing her off with an impatient hand. "I'll rest when we're done." She stands over him, unmoved, hands on hips. Harry sighs deeply. "OK," he says. "OK. Billy will tell the rest. I'll just sit here and listen."

Sue looks unsatisfied with this but it's all the compromise she's going to get, and she slips wordlessly from the room.

"So we had a problem," Billy says, staring at the floor.

I wish he would look at me, even a quick glance. He says "we", but I know, with absolute certainty, that he's had no say in keeping these things from me. Billy and I have always been in this together, neither of us certain of surviving the meadow without the other.

I'm sure Harry has made these decisions without consultation with Billy and the other elders. He's used his power as the Chief of this tribe to make sure that we know only what he wishes us to know.

Hidden somewhere, deep amongst all the other emotions swirling inside me, is a profound sense of loss.

Something noble, the gift of the Quileute Chief to guide his people with thought alone, has been sullied by Harry's single-minded determination to solve these problems his way, at a cost he doesn't seem to pause to consider.

I wonder briefly who will lead the Quileute when he's gone, and if the damage to these people can be repaired.

If Billy would only catch my eye I could tell him with a look, in the unspoken way that the most important of our conversations have always been held, that it's OK, that I know he's complicit without consent. But he doesn't. He takes a shaky breath and continues.

"Then, from nowhere, the Cullens came," he says. "You heard what Harry said. They don't hunt people, Charlie. They survive on the blood of animals. They can help us."

Of all the revelations that this long evening has brought, this is the one that I cannot process. The enormity of Harry's deception, the terror of my recurring nightmare spilling over into red-hued reality, the danger that my daughter and I have unknowingly been in; it all pales alongside this impossibility.

I cannot even comprehend that Billy called them by name, as though they are a family, as though they are _people_. I shake my head, unable to take it in.

"We've been talking to them for days, Charlie. We've hammered out a treaty that gives everyone what they want. They live here in the forest in peace, our tribe's future is assured, and Bella can stay here with you. We all win."

We're back where we were an hour ago and, for the first time in days, I know what's coming next. As Billy talks on, listing the details of the treaty, an image of the meadow, seven vampires, and me is all I can see.

It seems impossible that I could come out of that situation alive, even surrounded by every wolf in the tribe, but that's what he's going to ask me to do.

"The only thing that remains is for you to meet them," he says. "Harry wants you to see them for yourself, to put your mind at ease."

"No," Renee says, her eyes wild on mine. "No. Please, you can't ask him to do that." She turns to Harry. "He's done enough for you, for this town. He won't survive it," she says. "It's too big a risk, Harry, you know that."

I don't see that I have a choice, for many reasons. There is the safety and protection of the people of Forks and La Push to consider. I could hold Harry to ransom. I could tell him that unless he renders the treaty null and void and sends these blood-hunters away, Bella will be gone. I could tell him that even when I die, she won't be back.

But it's more personal than that for me.

Before Renee and Bella came back to Forks, I told myself that even if it all ended after a single day, it would be enough. I would savor whatever time we were given and if they had to leave and all I had left were memories, I would live on those.

I was a fool.

It is as though a river of the sweetest nectar flows at my feet, an ambrosial elixir with the power to grant me happiness beyond my wildest imaginings. To say goodbye to them now, to refuse what Harry wants of me and to send my wife and daughter away again, would be like tasting a single drop, sweet on my tongue, and then never drinking again.

Am I selfish enough to risk my life, to bargain my future, and Renee's, and Bella's, for the sake of my – of our - happiness.

It seems that I am.

Still, I won't go without my wife's blessing and, with a few quiet words, Billy makes sure that I'll get it.

He clears his throat and turns to the window, his eyes held by the distant, misty mountains. "My son is out there tonight," he whispers.

Renee gasps, a heartbreaking sound, as her focus widens. There is more at stake than just us and, maybe for the first time tonight, she sees that.

I reach with a steady hand and tuck a stray lock of hair behind her ear, run my palms up and down my legs, and rise.

"OK," I say. "OK. When do I go?"

~ O ~

Thank you so much for reading! Peace and love to all, xx.


	6. Chapter 6

Endless thanks, as always, to Annette (annetteinoz) and Liz (lizf22) for extreme patience and beta magic, and thanks also to Alby Mangroves for help with this chapter (and for lots and lots of other stuff too).

The technology baffles me, so Liz put everything together for a banner for Prism (thanks so much to Divine Inspiration for making!) which can be found on my profile.

Stephenie Meyer owns them.

Thanks so much for reading!

~~~ Bella ~~~

If there is a moon at all tonight, its light is hidden behind a veil of clouds. Not even the jagged line where the forest meets the sky is visible in the darkness. There are only the headlights leading us home, and the dashboard lights within. Their dim glow casts a soft green light on our faces, my mother's creased with worry and mine, burning with anger.

Charlie is spending the night at the Reservation, with Billy. They have decided to go hunting in the forest tomorrow and want an early start. At least, that's the story my mother told me.

After being dragged out to La Push straight from school by my parents, I sat with Emily on Billy's front porch for hours. Renee and Charlie left to look for Billy, speeding off without me.

I sat there with Emily, her mood as pensive as mine, rocking slowly in a wicker chair. She didn't know when Jake would be home, she said, her tone not inviting further questions. I wondered, as I waited, if there was some kind of trouble between them, but Emily wasn't talking, and I wasn't asking.

The silence wore on.

Eventually, we went to the store in La Push to buy some things for dinner, and that's where it happened.

An old man waited, leaning heavily on the arm of his younger companion, while she talked to the man behind the counter. The old man tugged at the lady's arm after a few moments, impatient.

"Come on, Elizabeth," he said, gruffly. "I want to get home."

The woman turned to him, kissed his cheek and cupped his face in her hands. "Always so impatient," she said, "since the day we got married."

My loud gasp drew their attention, and they turned to me, their dual expressions of mild curiosity turning, inexplicably, to wide-eyed recognition. I'd never seen them before in my life.

Mike's face by the fire on the beach flashed briefly before my eyes, with his earnest voice and his tall tales about old men and their younger widows.

The old man's face lit up as he looked at me.

"Isabella Swan," he said. He reached a trembling hand toward me, as though to touch my face, but his wife pulled him gently away. She led him slowly to the door, a sweet wistfulness lighting his lined face, as he gazed over his shoulder at me.

"Thank you," he mouthed, as he turned away.

I wheeled on Emily as the bell over the door rang their departure.

"Emily, what just happened?"

But she just shook her head, her eyes brimming with tears, saying nothing in reply.

"I know there's something about your tribe," I said, "and I know that somehow, it involves me. Please, don't tell me it doesn't. You have to tell me what's going on."

There was no answer for the longest moment until, finally, she spoke.

"I don't know what you're talking about," she whispered. "There's nothing going on here, Bella. Nothing at all."

~~~ O ~~~

A tinderbox was lit inside me in that store, and by the time Renee came back to Billy's house to pick me up, I was a seething mass of rage and fury, a hot bed of resentment and outrage.

The trail of lies is almost visible as we follow the winding road between La Push and Forks, and I have finally had enough of following it.

I want answers.

These unfamiliar feelings seem, at once, to be the most grown-up and the most childish I've ever had.

A phrase from a book pops unbidden into my head, something that resonated when I read it and has stayed with me since; a question that might help me find a way out of this maze of confusion.

_What would the wise woman do?_

Wisdom is far beyond me, but womanhood? That must surely be within my reach.

Where is the dividing line between girlhood and womanhood? Is it just the passing of the years, the gathering of certain experiences, or is there a moment, an attitude, a feeling?

My father, the Quileute, childhood, adulthood; these separate worlds, each with their secrets and mysteries, are colliding and crashing around me.

I've skulked around, cowed and bewildered, feeling like a child who has no right to intrude in the secret world of grown-ups. It's as though there is a walled garden where the adults gather, sharing secrets I am too young to hear. I stand hopelessly on the other side while they whisper behind their hands.

_Whatever you do, don't tell Bella_.

But it's not just the secrets, for their own sakes, that I long for. My parents have a life together that is separate to me. They share things that I'm not a part of. The Quileute do too. I understand that. I want only the knowledge that I have a right to, only the fragments of their whispered words that should be mine to know.

More than anything, though, it's the intimacy that revealing those secrets, that their very telling, would mean. I don't want to be alone on the other side of the wall anymore.

This collision of thought and feeling seems impenetrable, but I try to distil some purpose from the jumble. Tantrums and impetuousness are childish, I know that much, so I concentrate on breathing slow and deep, calming myself.

When I feel as though I have a tenuous hold on my emotions, I pause to consider what it is that's more important; the mysteries of the Quileute or what's happening in my own home?

The answer to that question at least, is easy.

~~~ O ~~~

My mother is distant and remote, her eyes darting left and right, probing the darkness on the winding road out of La Push.

"Mom," I say, "can I talk to you for a minute?"

"Not now, Bella," she says. "Please, not now."

Her offhand tone fuels the fire and I wait a moment, until it burns off a little. I feel as though I'm standing on the precipice, vertiginous and swaying, but ready to take the leap. I square my shoulders and raise my chin.

"I know you have something on your mind, but so do I, and I'd like to talk about it now, please."

She glances at me, scanning my face warily.

"OK," she says, reluctantly, "if it can't wait."

"What I want to know is, should I get settled here?"

"What?" she says. I have her full attention now, the frown of concern clear on her face, even in the dim half-light.

"I know what's going on," I say.

"What do you mean, Bella? You know what's going on?"

"I think that my father has relapsed, and I want to know if you're going to leave him again."

Her head snaps up and she stares at me, wide eyed.

"What, Bella? Relapsed?"

"I've seen his arms, Mom. I've seen the scars."

"You've seen...," she says faintly. "When did you see his arms?"

"You were dancing in the living room late one night. Neil Young?"

"I remember," she says. "Our song. You saw?"

"You left him all those years ago because of the drugs, didn't you? And we came back here now because he's off them. Billy came to see you last summer. He came to convince you, didn't he, that Charlie was OK."

My voice rises higher with every word, and Renee pulls the car over by the side of the road, the gravel crunching under the tires.

I seem to have lost her again, her attention fixed outside the car.

She stares into the forest, as though looking for something hidden in the darkness. A low howl close by breaks the silence, and Renee shudders, sighs, and turns to me.

"That's what's been happening, isn't it?" I say. "He's back on them and he's staying at the Reservation so Billy can help him."

"You have it all wrong," she says, her hands white-knuckled on the steering wheel. "Those scars aren't what you think they are."

"They're not needle marks?"

"Your father isn't on drugs, Bella. He's never taken a drug in his life. He won't even take a painkiller when he has a headache."

"Well, what then? I saw those scars." The tears are coming now, hot humiliation and salty frustration, streaming down my face. "Please, Mom," I plead. "Please."

She reaches a hand across to soothe me, but I pull away, far away, until I'm nothing but a bitter ball of misery, hunched in the corner. She sighs.

"Do you remember in Phoenix, when I told you that your father and I wanted to live together again, that we wanted us all to live here together?"

"Of course I remember. You asked me if I would be okay with that."

"Yes."

"And I didn't ask you why. I let you have your privacy. I didn't intrude. But I didn't know it was something like this." Hysteria frays at the edge of every word, pulling me apart, thread by thread, until I'm completely undone. "It's why you couldn't be together, isn't it? All that time I thought he didn't want you, I thought he didn't want us, but he did, he did want us. He just wanted the drugs more."

"No!" The word rips through the air toward me like a blow, pushing my head back and stealing my breath. The sobs burst from me, powerful and uncontrolled. This time I don't pull away from my mother's touch.

Renee hushes me and rocks me, just as she did when I was the little girl I seem to have become again. When the tears finally run dry, she smoothes the hair gently away from my eyes.

"Bella, you must believe me when I tell you that those scars aren't from drugs."

"But you won't tell me what they are from," I whisper.

"No, I won't."

"Because you think I can't handle it, because you think I'm too young."

"No, Bella, it's not about that. It's about what's best for you. It's not about age or maturity." She wipes the tears from my cheeks and continues in that same slow, gentle voice, as though she's speaking to someone very young. "Innocence has nothing to do with those things."

"But you get to decide," I say, my voice hoarse in the darkness. "You and Dad, Emily and Jake. Everybody else gets to decide what's best for me."

She doesn't reply, and so I remain, alone on the other side of the wall.

~~~ O ~~~

My mother stands at the kitchen sink, her hand white-knuckled on the tap, filling the kettle. She peers out the window, searching the trees beyond the yard, as though listening for something, cursing softly when the kettle overflows. She startles when I take it gently from her hand.

Last night, when I couldn't sleep again, I pulled the song up on You Tube, the one they'd been dancing to that night.

The video begins with a full moon hanging above a tree in a cloudless sky, before the camera pans down to a parking lot outside a bar. It could easily be Forks and the truck parked in the corner could be mine, but it was the white words that appeared on the screen that caught my eye.

_Neil Young_

_Harvest Moon_

_1993_

1993. I was six years old when that song was recorded.

There's no rain again this morning and the radio stands silent on the kitchen bench. There's nothing to muffle the too-loud sounds of water sloshing and teaspoons clanking as I make tea for us both.

I sip my tea and Renee stares into hers. She rises suddenly, twitching at the curtain, staring out the window to the woods beyond.

A thought came to me last night as I listened to that song, stealthy and treacherous. An idea, an explanation, a possibility.

I passed the night rolling that thought, and all it could mean, around and around and around. I examined if from every angle, as though it was a rare gem, cold in my palm. I looked at it from this angle and that, held it up to the light, trying to find a crack or a flaw.

There weren't any.

Thousands of miles separated my parents during the long years of their estrangement, geographical barriers of distance and time. And in all that time, in seventeen years, neither of them ever remarried or even dated, neither moved on from the other.

How many couples who live at different ends of the country, who've been separated for six years, whose marriage is over, discover "their song"?

It was only ever geography that separated them.

"Mom," I say and she startles again, turning to me.

"Bella?" There's fear in her eyes. She's afraid I'm going to demand answers again, answers she won't give.

But, no, it's not that.

It's worse than that.

"I just -," I stammer, so I pause for a moment. I want to be strong when I say this. I wait, a moment too long, but when I do speak, the words come firm and clear.

"Do you remember that talk we had about love, years ago in Phoenix?" She looks mystified.

"You told me what you thought love is, that real love, true love, is all about honesty and trust. You told me that with those two things, comes dignity, and with dignity, love flourishes."

"I remember now," she says, eyeing me warily.

"You told me all that," I say. "You did." She nods. "And I believed what you said. I still do."

She nods again.

I take a deep breath, filling my lungs and holding them full for a few beats. The moment of silence gathers, adding weight to an atmosphere so heavy with expectation, that it feels hard to let the breath out.

But I do. I exhale, and the words come, carried on that single breath across the distance between us, wider than I ever thought it could be. The words, cold and brutal, deliver the truth.

"You leave me with no dignity, Mom."

She opens her mouth to speak, but I hold up a hand. I need to get this out now, before my courage fades.

"I don't know what's wrong with my father. You've chosen not to tell me and I won't ask again. I don't want to ever feel that young and foolish again. I just – I thought you should know that."

Again she begins to speak, and I shake my head.

"There's something else, too." I swallow heavily, afraid but sure of myself, too. I know I'm right this time. "I just wanted to tell you that I know that you and my father were really together all that time in Phoenix, all those years when I thought you were apart. I know that now."

"I thought you might want to know that," I say, with a shrug. "That I know. One less thing for you to hide from me. One less thing to feel guilty about."

"Oh, Bella," is all she says, and I go to her, holding her, while she cries it out, just as she did for me last night.

I feel cold, though, and remote to her misery, not engaged in it. It's not of my making.

I want to tell her that I'm sorry for doing this to her, for upsetting her like this. I want to tell her that I don't really mean it. I want to tell her that it's OK, that I understand.

But I don't.

Those words would be lies and so I leave her in silence, with her dignity intact.

~~~ O ~~~

I run my fingers along the spines of the books in piles along the wall in the living room, some lined and cracked with use, others smooth and untouched. The book isn't there. I sit back on my heels, thinking.

I hit the internet hard this morning, searching for answers. All I've ended up with is a mass of confusing, inconclusive theories, just as I thought I would.

Depending on which link I clicked, the Quileute have a genetic defect that causes their early deaths, or their diet, consisting primarily of fish and seafood, leads to Minamata Disease caused by mercury poisoning, or any one of a hundred other theories.

There was even a webpage concluding that the Quileute, who, according to their legends are descended from wolves, can actually morph into these animals at will. The act of doing this causes such stress on their bodies, that they age prematurely and die.

I gave up and closed my laptop after reading that one.

Renee is on the phone in the kitchen now, chewing her nails as she listens intently. I take a chance and climb the stairs two at a time, hesitate for a moment at the door, and go in.

I've haven't really been in this room before. Once briefly the day we got here, with Renee tugging my hand in a burst of manic happiness, dragging me all over the house and yard. My parents' bedroom has a different mood to the rest of the house. It seems quieter somehow, more still than the other rooms.

The knowledge that I shouldn't be in here, that Charlie and Renee wouldn't like it and that I'm here anyway, surprises and frightens me.

The book is on a shelf in Renee's nightstand, wedged between a glossy book on French country interiors and another on the history of textiles in Japan. It's thicker than I remember, heavier, and I'd be worried Renee might notice it missing if she wasn't so distracted.

My expectation of this book providing any rational, conclusive answers is low, but I don't know where else to look.

When I open it in my bedroom, with the door firmly closed behind me, a piece of paper drifts to the floor. The drawing is just as I remember it. The two old women sit with their heads together, stitching at the fabric on their knees, just like the ladies at the Reservation that day.

I put the drawing on my desk and leaf through the book.

There are pages of pictures and text on the history of the Quileute tribe and their culture and legends, everything anyone could possibly want to know about this ancient tribe, but nowhere does it mention the accelerated ageing that Mike spoke of by the fire.

I turn to the front of the book and under the Index there is a heading: _Unexplained Deaths of Quileute Men_. I'm not sure how I could have missed that section but when I try to find the pages, they're not there. They've been torn, roughly, from the book.

There aren't any bookstores in Forks and, with no credit card of my own, ordering online isn't an option.

There's only one way.

It's time for a visit to Port Angeles.

~~~ O ~~~

We go after school on Thursday in Angela's car. Jessica turns the radio up, and they sing at the top of their lungs as we roar down the 101. They're giddy and giggling, high on excitement. Prom is coming to Forks High and Port Angeles beckons, calling my friends with the promise of dresses and shoes and jewellery, all just waiting to be picked over.

I wind the window down in the back and feel the tension ease, as Forks disappears behind me. It feels good to be doing something light-hearted and frivolous.

Charlie isn't happy about me being here, his reasons unclear, but he doesn't seem pleased about much these days. He and Renee seem better with each other, at least. They're not happy exactly, but they seem to be more unified, as though my outburst was the catalyst for bringing them closer again.

I wish we could recapture the sweet flavor of those brief days when we first moved here, but it's gone. A bitter aftertaste is all that remains, and my parents have withdrawn, together, into their world, while I search for a new one of my own.

Angela, Jessica and I visit a couple of clothes shops, and I leave them in the third one, pirouetting in front of the mirror, swathed in yards of satin and taffeta.

Port Angeles is pretty in the late afternoon light, with the workaday people bustling home, their end of day sighs mingling and lightening the heavy air.

Jessica scrawled directions to the book shop in her loopy writing on a scrap of paper and I squint, trying to decipher the words. After a few wrong turns I find the small shop, nestled in a side street. I phoned ahead and they have the book waiting for me, and I'm out on the sidewalk again in less than five minutes.

The temptation to stop and read is high, my fingers twitching on the cover, but the girls will be waiting for me. It will have to wait.

As I round the corner near Angela's car, a tall figure across the street catches my eye.

I can't really make out his features from this distance. There's nothing but a general impression of dark clothes, darker brows and pale skin. He's like an apparition in the shadows, backlit against a shop window, spectral and haunting.

Even though he's standing very still, his fists clenched at his sides, there's something wild about him. He seems coiled, poised, waiting for something. It's as though he's barely contained in his skin, as though something primal and chaotic beats there, humming through his veins, searching for a way out, a direction to head in.

He looks dangerous.

Unthinking, transfixed, I step off the curb and catch, too late, a flash of blue in the corner of my eye. The screeching brakes and blasting horn echo through the air and I turn toward the sounds, hands helplessly before me.

There's only time for one huge intake of breath, surely my last, before I hit the ground.

I lie immobile on the asphalt, breathing hard, struggling to make sense of what my rattled senses are telling me.

A hand cradles my head and dark eyes stare, only inches away, into mine. His other hand drifts to my waist and, where my t-shirt has ridden up, cold fingers glide over my skin. The hand moves swiftly away toward the silver grille on the van, so close to my head that my breath clouds the steel when I turn toward it.

There on the grille, in clear relief, and visible for only the briefest of moments, is the unmistakeable indentation of a hand. A blur of white skin before my eyes and, seconds later, it's gone. The grille is unmarked, as good as new.

I turn back, bewildered, trapped by jet black eyes, breathing deeply of sweet scented breath.

His hand drifts to mine and a single finger glides cool over my skin, leaving a thousand white-hot sparks burning in its wake.

A moan, as soft as a sigh, falls from his lips and then a single word, uttered like a curse. A blur of movement and before I can blink, he's gone.

By the time the driver gets out of his van, his face a mask of horror, I'm alone, trembling on the cold, black road.

~~~ O ~~~

The book is unopened on my bed, laid aside for now, as the impossible events of the afternoon tumble endlessly in my head. Of all the strange things that have happened since my life in Forks began, this is the strangest.

When I'd stopped shaking enough to get up from the road, I made Jessica and Angela take me to the hospital in Port Angeles.

Surely I had a concussion. Surely he was some trick of the light, the quirk of a mind rattled by shock.

Even without the impossibility of what he did, his face, haunting and otherworldly, can't be real. Nobody looks like that.

He was like a fleeting glimpse from another world, of angel and devil combined to form something new; something benevolent, terrifying and beautiful. He held me suspended in that small moment, that narrow space I occupied briefly, caught somewhere between life and death.

He looked as though he wanted to destroy me, even as he saved my life.

But, no, the doctor said. No concussion, no internal injuries, not even a headache. The driver of the van suffered worse injuries than I did, jolted as he was by the sudden, jarring halt of his car.

There's no way I would have survived the hit from that van, and the thought sends a shudder through my body. I should be dead. I _would_ be dead, if not for him.

Did I really see that handprint in the metal grille? Do I really believe, in my heart, that he stopped that van dead in its tracks, that he crossed that road in the blink of an eye?

Yes. It seems I do. There's no other explanation, and yet it's impossible.

It seems impossible, too, that I should remember it with such clarity. My eyes must have been greedy on his skin as he held me, because I recall now every shadow and angle of his face. Alabaster skin, flawless and pale, a canvas for the dark eyes and red lips, the line of cheekbone and jaw that, together, formed a face more beautiful than any artist has ever captured with oil paint and brush.

If I'd had any breath left as I lay on that freezing asphalt, it would have been taken away.

The Tiffany lamp next to my bed doesn't throw out much light, so I turn the overhead light on and examine my body, once again, in the mirror. There's barely a bruise or a cut, no swollen flesh or marked skin. The only evidence that anything happened at all is a small scrape, so tiny it's barely visible, on the heel of my left hand.

I run trembling fingers gently over my skin, turning my hand this way and that, mesmerised and mystified. My flesh still burns from his touch and a shiver, as cold as his fingers, runs down my spine.

Only one word passed between us, an unexpected word, seemingly without context, before he fled.

That solitary syllable hums through the air still, like some restless bird, lost and alone, searching without hope for a place to land.

_Blood._

~ O ~

Thank you so much for reading :)


	7. Chapter 7

Huge and heartfelt thanks to Lizf22, Annetteinoz and Alby Mangroves – I just can't thank them enough.

I also wanted to say thanks to Katinki (and others around the place) for very generous recc-ing of this story. Really blown away, so BIG thanks. (There's a link to Katinki's review in The Fictionators in my profile, if you're interested.)

Finally (sorry for this looong A/N), Charlie has been nominated in the Sunflower Awards (link also in my profile) – thanks so much to whoever nominated!

Thanks so much for reading!

Disclaimer: Stephenie Meyers owns them. Maybe Melissa Rosenberg owns a little too.

~~~ Charlie ~~~

Renee's body curves around mine like a free-form sculpture, modelled from something warm and pliant. The soft shapes and sharp angles of her skin and bones, of her _self_, cover and fill the empty spaces around me like nothing else can. She used to sleep like that in Phoenix too, wrapped around me, like she was made to fit there.

I'd always thought it was desperation that kept her so close to me, but I know better now.

If the choice was mine, I'd never move again, but my aching body is demanding otherwise. Fatigue and tension, that terrible combination, have joined forces to make my bones feel like they're calcified. It's impossible to keep still and it hurts to move.

Three days have passed since my night with Billy at the Reservation. I came home the next morning to a house where the tension, already tight as a drum, had been wound even tighter. Renee and Bella, always so close that I envied them, are now separated by a chasm so wide, I don't know if it can ever be crossed.

Bella hid away in her bedroom that day, secluded and separate, while Renee and I talked. We spent hours going over it all; the Quileute, Harry's deception, the coven of vampires waiting in the mountains and, most of all, Bella. We talked in endless circles, taking every possible dead-end path and nowhere trail, ending up right back where we started.

"I should have just lied to her," Renee said, curled up on our bed. "I should have told her that you have a medical condition or something. I don't know. She just took me by surprise, I guess, and I was so worried about you. I couldn't think straight." She picks at the battered box of tissues by her side, her eyes so red they look painful. "I didn't want to lie to her, Charlie. I just really didn't want to lie to her anymore."

There's a way to solve this, of course, a way to gain Bella's trust back and end the lies and concealment forever. It's obvious and it's simple, easy in its execution but hard in every other way. It's the one thing we vowed we'd never do.

We tell Bella the truth.

I roll over and punch the pillow, Renee moving with me as though she'll never let go. I stare at the narrow gap where our drapes don't quite meet, both longing for, and dreading, that first chink of daylight that, surely, can't be far off now.

_The truth._

It's such a small word, no bigger than an inch, no bigger than that narrow space between the curtains.

_Tell Bella the truth._

I was fourteen when my father was killed.

The day after we buried him, my mother and I sat on our porch swing, rocking gently in the cool evening breeze. I didn't realise we were waiting for someone until Harry pulled into our drive, striding across the lawn with purpose, Billy trailing behind him.

We'd always been the same size growing up, Billy and I, but he towered over me now. He sat on the porch step without looking at me, stripping and shredding leaves from my mother's rhododendron, and tossing them at his feet.

At first I thought Harry had come to talk to my mother. The two recently bereaved, a wife and a brother, losing those two men side by side in the forest. But Harry Clearwater pulled up a chair in front of the porch swing and trained his dark eyes right on mine.

"It's time," he said gravely, "for you to know the truth."

Those eyes didn't shift once as he told me a Gothic horror story; a tale of evil creatures that hunt in the forest, leaving a trail of bloodless bodies in their wake. He spoke of the mighty Quileute warrior who has the magic to transform, body and spirit, from man to wolf.

He told me of the many Quileute who have been lost over the generations as they defended their people from the blood-hunters, and the accidental discovery, in my grandfather's time, of the blood-magic that has saved so many.

He spoke of the tragedy of losing his brother, his life taken beside my father, and his pride at taking his brother's place as Chief of the Quileute.

I sat there on the porch swing and listened to his stories, mostly out of respect for him, but also because I didn't believe them. All the while, though, I wondered why Billy wouldn't look at me, and why my mother gripped my hand so tightly.

I found out soon enough.

"We are a magical people, Charlie," he said. "We have gifts and powers far beyond the imagining of ordinary man. But even then, a Quileute wolf alone can't kill the blood-hunter. It takes many of us to overpower just one of them, for as strong and powerful as we are, they are stronger."

"Their strength comes from blood, Charlie," he continues, "from human blood. They need that blood more than anything else, they want it more than we want the air we breathe."

He leant forward in his chair then, and I was held, disbelieving but spellbound.

"And more than any other blood," he said, "they want yours."

I wanted to laugh then - I tried to - but the small, half-formed sound died in my throat.

I looked from my mother to Billy and back again, waiting for a shake of the head, the hint of a smile, something – anything – to break the spell. These things he was saying weren't true, they couldn't be, but Billy went right on shredding the rhododendron, and my mother covered her face with her hand.

I looked down at my arms, at the blue veins just beneath the pale skin on my wrist. The pulse in my throat was beating so hard, I swear I could feel every drop of the blood that ran through those veins.

I covered them, a hand on the opposite wrist, so I couldn't see them anymore.

Harry stood then and walked to the edge of the porch, gazing up at the clear night sky. Then he turned and knelt before me, his large hand gripping my smaller one.

"Your blood," Harry said, as though speaking of something sacred and holy, "oh, Charlie, your blood is a precious thing. You call the blood-hunter to you, Charlie, like the moon calls the ocean."

"You are a Quileute warrior in your blood," he said, "just like your father and your grandfather. You fight beside us in the meadow when the blood-hunter comes. You call him to you with your magic, and we kill him with ours."

He took my wrists firmly, too firmly, and held them before my wide, unblinking eyes.

"You are a warrior," he said, the passion in his voice compelling and frightening. "In your blood, Charlie Swan, you are Quileute."

He rose with a nod, his eyes gleaming, as though there could be no greater gift than the one he'd just given me. I could still feel his fingers tight around my wrists and I rubbed them, soft at first and then harder, until my mother put a gentle hand on my arm.

"Mom?" I said, and finally she looked me in the eye.

"It will be alright, Charlie," she whispered. "Harry is here to help you."

I had no choice, then, but to believe.

That was the moment I realised, without a word or a look, that it wasn't a mountain lion that killed my father, it wasn't a mountain lion that killed Harry's brother. A shudder ran across my shoulders and all the way down my back, and fear washed through my veins like poison.

When I looked up again, Harry still stood there, waiting.

"But, Mr Clearwater," I said, missing my father so much I could barely breathe, "if they want my blood so much, wouldn't you want to keep me away from them?"

His eyes changed then. The gleam faded, replaced instead with something cold and hard.

_His grief, _I thought. _He's burying his grief for my father and his brother deep down, so deep that no one can see it. It's the only way he can do this._

It felt like a very grown-up thought to me, maybe my first, and I realised I'd probably become a man sooner than I'd thought.

"I can see how you might think that, Charlie, but a blood-hunter is a cunning and powerful thing. Even with our strength and speed, even with our thoughts joined to become one spirit, a blood-hunter is not an easy thing to kill."

I nodded slowly, unblinking.

Still I didn't understand what he was asking me to do.

"We need your help, son," Harry said. "We need you like they need blood."

The first ray of morning sun shines through the curtains now, an inch of daylight creeping into our bedroom. Renee stirs, nuzzling into my neck and sighing softly as she sleeps. Her arm snakes across my chest, resting on my shoulder, and I put my hand on hers, holding her there.

She doesn't cling to me, as I'd always thought in Phoenix, because she can't bear to let me go.

It's not her fear of losing me that binds her so close to me. It's not a need in her that she's filling. She wraps me up and holds me tight because she knows, even as she sleeps, that she's the only thing keeping me together.

My mother held my hand, too, all those years ago on the porch swing, as tightly as Renee holds me now.

"What do I have to do?" I asked Harry, my voice cracking on the words.

He laid an arm on my shoulder then, as heavy as a shackle, and looked me dead in the eyes as he drove the bolt home.

"We need your blood, Charlie," he said. "You're the bait."

~~~ O ~~~

I run hot water in the bathroom basin, lather my face, pick up the razor, and put it straight back down again. The cut, low near my chin, has healed, but a red mark is still visible. I scar easily.

It's hard to believe that something so small, so harmless, could have delayed something of such importance as the rendezvous in the meadow.

I didn't sleep that night at the Reservation after Renee and Bella went home. Billy and I stayed up until dawn while he told me all he'd learned about the vampires, these "Cullens". We worked on strategies for the meadow, tactics and fallback plans in case things went wrong.

And then dawn broke, and it was time to go.

At first I thought it was fatigue that caused the trembling in my hands that morning at Billy's, that made the razor slip and cut. As soon as I saw the blood I knew there would be no meeting in the meadow that day. There was no way I could be anywhere near those vampires with an open wound, no matter how small.

There was nothing to do but come home and wait.

Those three long days of waiting have driven me to the outer limits of what I can stand, wanting equally to have it done with, and for the moment never to come. The cut may be healed, but the tremor in my hands that caused it shows no sign of abating.

Renee comes in and sits on the edge of the bathtub, her bathrobe wrapped around her tightly, rubbing her sleepy eyes.

"When do you go?" she asks.

"As soon as I'm done here," I say, but I make no move to pick the razor up again.

I've tried to hide my trembling hands from Renee. The worries are piled a dozen deep, and I have no wish to bury her under more.

She watches me intently for a moment, our eyes meeting through the mist on the mirror. Then she rises and sits on the vanity before me, my hips snug between her knees. With her eyes never leaving mine, she takes my hands one by one, and kisses each palm.

"Charlie," she whispers, picking up the razor, "why don't you let me do that?"

I should have known she'd notice.

I grip her hips to still the trembling as she squints a little, her head tilted, appraising me.

"Just be very still," she says quietly. "Don't move."

She picks up the razor and begins, her face so close to mine I can hear her breathing. She frowns with concentration, the only sound the gentle plunk of water in the basin, as she slides the razor slowly over my skin.

Every single heartbreaking, gut-wrenching, insurmountable problem that we have slides away for these few moments. I revel in the respite, watching her, spellbound.

Her brown eyes are serious and she takes her time, being careful. There are dull shadows under those eyes, and fine lines around them that weren't there, even a week ago. The two vertical furrows, the ones that appear between her eyebrows when she paints, appear now too, as she strokes and rinses, strokes and rinses.

Her dark hair is bundled in a mess on top of her head, all except a single, stray lock that's escaped and rests on her shoulder. It curls up when she leans to dip the razor in the basin, and straightens when she turns back to me.

She pauses, surveying her work, and I reach up and gently pull the band from her hair. Her eyes dart to mine and away, and she smiles, and then grins. She shakes her hair out a little and it dances on her shoulders, and through my fingers.

"I can't do this if you're smiling," she says.

I try to compose my face into something serious, but she catches my eye and we dissolve together in mindless, helpless laughter, losing ourselves in this tiny bathroom, and in each other, for a few sweet, easy minutes.

When we've finally pulled ourselves together, weak and spent, Renee finishes up and lets the water out of the basin, and I wipe a towel over my face.

"There," she says, running delicate fingers over my cheek. "Done."

She slides off the vanity and moves behind me, wrapping her arms around me tight. Her chin rests on my shoulder as she gazes at me in the mirror. Those brown eyes are serious now and the tension, stretched and weakened briefly, snaps right back into place.

I sigh deeply. Her mouth opens a few times on a deep breath, but no words come. I know what she's going to say, though, even before she says it. I know, because there is nothing else left _to_ say.

"Charlie," she says, "maybe it's time we told her the truth."

"Renee," I say, shaking my head, but before I can continue my mind glides away, an image of the meadow slipping into view.

That night on the porch swing, Harry Clearwater made it sound like a mystical place, romantic or maybe even holy, but it's not like that.

Not at all.

It's like descending into the sixth circle of Hell.

~~~ O ~~~

Cleared long ago by the Quileute, the meadow is an unnaturally perfect circle hidden deep within the forest. Surrounded by moss covered trees on level ground, it's battlefield and fortress combined.

No matter the season, whether spread with a carpet of flowers or buried inches deep in snow, its beauty is undeniable. But it's a grotesque beauty to me, like a fine satin cloak encrusted with diamonds, disguising the evil crone beneath.

The meadow is tainted forever by the unspeakable things that take place there.

An uneasy silence falls whenever I wait there for the vampires to come; no bird or insect stirs, no scurry of feet on the forest floor. The animals are the first to flee when the blood-hunters are stalking.

That silence is broken soon enough.

Distant at first, but getting closer at inhuman speed, the wail of a vampire is a sound not easily forgotten. And that sound means only one thing.

It has caught my scent.

Howling in the distance, it claws at the bark that's painted with my blood, scouring the ground for every drop on the earth. Insane with bloodlust, tearing and scratching at its throat, its screams split the air as it hurtles through the trees.

It's following a trail that leads straight to me.

The Quileute hang back, prowling low and silent, waiting for the right moment to strike. The timing is crucial. Too soon, and the vampire will retaliate, fighting for its prey. Too late, and I die.

That moment comes when it hears my heartbeat.

Rabid and mindless, nothing can stop it now. Its path is set. Billy paces and circles around me, hackles raised and teeth bared, growling low and slow.

There's nothing I want more in that moment – _nothing _– than to run.

The meadow explodes into a chaotic blur as the vampire tears through the trees, lunging straight for my throat. Quileute descend from every direction and the ripping and tearing and howling begins.

If we get lucky, and there's only one, it might be over quickly. But if there's two or three, it goes on for too long, for so long that I'm sure I can't bear another second.

When it's done, and the torn limbs and scraps of flesh lay scattered on the ground, the fire is lit. The Quileute bring driftwood and light the match, and thick smoke darkens the sky. The forest is alight with fire and brimstone.

The warriors lick their wounds, healing fast, and the celebration begins. They dance naked in the moonlight, in the daylight, in the sun or in the snow, around and around the blue-flamed fire until the flowers are flattened, the snow blackened with ash.

No matter that we've won again, no matter that we've survived the meadow once more to fight again another day, I can never bring myself to join them.

I turn my back and walk away on legs that barely carry me, without a backward glance.

This, then – the snapping teeth at my throat, the acrid smell of burning flesh, the dead weight of duty, and the endless, crippling fear - this is the truth. It's my truth, and one day, when I'm too old or incapacitated or when I die, it will be Bella's, too.

I don't know how long I've been standing here with Renee, but when her face sharpens into focus, it's wet with tears. My eyes slide from her face to mine in the mirror, and I see why. Ashen and shaking, lips dry and eyes wild, I look completely and utterly terrified.

I don't have the words to convey to Renee what it's like in the meadow, and wild horses couldn't drag them from me if I did. I won't fill her head with such horror, any more than I'll fill Bella's.

It's a terrible thing, to have the power to destroy a person's peace of mind forever. I still don't know where Harry Clearwater found the courage to do it to me, but he did it because he didn't have a choice.

I do.

"I won't tell her until I have to, Renee," I say. "Please don't ask me to. I'd rather have her think anything of us, of me, I'd rather lose her forever, than tell her truth."

I turn to her and wipe the tears from her eyes.

It's not in me to do what she's asked of me, and I think she knows that, but still, I see it in her eyes. She knows as well as I do that we're trying to catch the edge of a dream, to hold onto a wisp of cloud as it drifts away.

Anything could happen in the meadow today, but somehow I know that if Bella stays, her time as an innocent bystander in this murky, deadly underworld will come to an end.

And then Renee says it.

The word that has danced at the edges of my mind for days, the one I have fought off time and time again.

She says it.

"Run," she whispers in my ear. "Let's run, Charlie. Now, this morning. The three of us. Let's run."

I don't reply. I can't. I owe it to the Quileute, to Billy, to the people of Forks, to see this through. And there's still a chance, the smallest hope, that there might be a way for this coven to live high in the mountains, while my daughter lives safely in Forks.

The dream may not be over yet.

But still, the word is there, tantalising and tempting.

_Run._

~ O ~

Thanks so much for reading!

Charlie has some things to do, so the next chapter will be his as well.


	8. Chapter 8

As always, thank you thank you thank you to Liz (many, many chat hours were burned up with this chapter), Annette and Alby. They're wonderful women to give up their time for this.

Thanks for reading (and reviewing, if you're so inclined!).

Disclaimer: Stephenie Meyer owns them.

~ Charlie ~

Billy and I drive through the forest in his truck, the dirt road winding through the trees as we head further away from the 101. It's been four years, but I remember every twist and turn, every bump in the road.

Nothing changes, and everything does.

I slide unsteady fingers into the pocket of my jacket one more time, checking again for the rosary beads. There's nowhere they could have gone, but still I'm reassured at the feel of the smooth beads and the delicate rose gold links. They didn't do my father much good in the end, but here they are anyway, the talisman that my mother always insisted I carry with me.

The leather satchel sits on my lap and I fumble with the zip, checking the contents. The needles are there, the swabs, the vials; everything is in there just as it should be, clean and lined up and ready. It won't leave Billy's truck but still, I couldn't leave it behind. I never really realised that I was a superstitious man until today. I try to smile at myself, at my hope that these rituals and good luck charms will help keep me safe, but my mouth won't make the right shape.

I give up and look out the window.

The forest meanders by, softly lit by the rising sun. The trees stand tall under their mossy coats, the ferns like frilly maidens curtseying at their feet. It's still and quiet in the forest today, no wind or rain, not even a howling wolf in the distance to mark the time.

"You still go for your run every morning?" Billy asks from nowhere, startling me.

"What?"

"Your run," he says. "You still go?"

"You know I do," I reply, puzzled. The Quileute watch every move I make; he knows exactly how often I run. Is he trying to distract me, to take my mind off where we're heading, what we're about to do? That doesn't seem right though. Billy doles out words like they'll run out if he uses too many. I've never heard him make small talk in my life.

He changes down a gear as he eases the truck around a tight bend, turning his face to me as the wheel slides back through his fingers.

"Do you think about it much?" he asks.

"Running?" I say. "No, I don't think about it."

"Maybe you should," he says, staring straight ahead at the track through the forest.

My stomach, churning already, turns like a whirlpool as his meaning hits me.

He's telling me to run.

I stare at his profile, backlit against the truck window, urging my mind to work, to think, to figure out what this means.

"Is this more dangerous than Harry's letting on?"

He shakes his head easily and looks me in the eye so I can see that his are clear. "No," he says. "You know Harry wouldn't have you out here if he wasn't sure."

He's right, I do know that. In a bizarre paradox, Harry's lies and deception are just about the only reassuring thing in this whole situation. I'm not sure where the limits of what he'll do to protect his people lie, but I don't think he's reached them yet. Without me, Quileute will die, and he'll do just about anything to protect them. I don't trust him with the truth anymore, but I still trust him with my life. Is Billy telling me I shouldn't?

The track curves around a fallen tree that has lain there for as long as I can remember, the saplings that have sprouted along its length stunted and spindly. I close my eyes briefly. We're almost there.

"Billy," I say, "should we run?"

But he doesn't answer.

I remember a game we played years ago, back when Harry was trying to make all this seem less frightening, before my first trip to the meadow. Harry, without saying a word, would tell Billy something, ordering him to keep it from me. Harry would then take me aside, and tell me the same thing. I'd try every way I could think of to get Billy to break Harry's hold over him, but no matter what I did, Billy could never get the words out.

He glances quickly at me now, a brief sweep of his eyes, just long enough for me to see the change in them, the dull cast. The Quileute's submission to the will of their Chief is absolute and he's reached the limit of what he can say, but those dead eyes tell me everything.

If the answer was no, he would have just said so.

We pull up at the perimeter of the meadow, and I lean on the car door for a moment, my mind racing. I wish more than ever before that I could just talk to Billy, free from constraints and boundaries. I have to believe what he said about Harry thinking this meeting is safe enough, so why, then? Why should we run and, more to the point, how?

We'd have to go quietly, north at first, away from the coven holed up in the mountains to the south. And then what? Bella was safe in Phoenix for two reasons; because of the sunshine and because there were always Quileute hidden in the shadows watching her – just in case.

Harry would have the tribe follow us – he'd probably try and follow us himself - but would he have them protect us still, even if we turned our backs on them?

Billy waits quietly while I take these few moments to think, until even his patience is tested. He clears his throat. I need time to think this through but there isn't any just now. I know he doesn't mean for me to run from the meadow. Vampires love nothing more than a moving target. There will be time later to think.

I force myself to concentrate on the here and now.

"Just three?" I ask.

He nods. "That's what they agreed to."

Three only; that was my condition. It's not without difficulty, but the Quileute have taken three before. We can handle that.

"OK then," I say, "let's go."

~~~ O ~~~

I cast an eye over the clearing before me as I step into the circle. The meadow stands as it always has, strangely perfect in this wild, imperfect world. The Quileute have nurtured it with a gardener's care, and it hasn't changed much in four years; only the black hollow where the fire once burned has healed.

Harry waits for me there, his long hair thinned out and grey, leaning on a walking cane I haven't seen him use before. He looks very small, hunched over that cane, but noble still, like some mystical wizard whose powers can't be diminished by the passing of time.

I take my place next to him as Billy, without a word, shimmers briefly and explodes with a leap at my side. Whatever his thoughts were, they're more lost to me than ever. He's entered a world where I can't follow, a world where those thoughts are shared with his brothers, where he has the power to tear apart the most fearsome creatures on earth. Black fur shivers up and down his back as he settles into his skin, his ears pricked and his nose to the air. He's ready.

The ground beneath my feet begins to vibrate and even though I expect it, the pulsing dread in my throat still beats a little harder. The Quileute begin filing into the meadow, enormous beasts loping through the early morning gloom, one after the other, their collective weight enough to make the earth move. They pause before me, an earthy rainbow of brown and black and grey and rust, dropping their heads briefly as they pass by.

Billy has used the three day delay wisely, and each Quileute knows exactly where to go. They form three rows, two in front of me and one behind, and sit on their haunches waiting, benign and noble in repose. Billy paces and circles around me, nose twitching at the air.

Clusters of grey clouds loom, leaden and dense overhead, but there's no rain. Harry follows my gaze, tilting his head to the sky.

"No sunlight," he says, with a nod.

The Quileute do not like to see vampires in sunlight, and I've never asked why.

I don't even really know what they look like. I hear them as they come at me, wailing and hissing, baying for my blood. Sometimes, if they get close enough, I hear the snapping of their teeth at my throat, feel their cold breath on my neck, but they are seldom more than a frenzied blur to my eyes. It's only when they lay in pieces on the ground that they're still enough for me to see, and by then I don't want to look.

Billy tried to describe them to me once years ago, but I stopped him. My nightmares have always been faceless and hazy, more feeling and color than thought or shape. Bright red hair burning through the trees and darting at my shadow is the clearest image I've ever had of these demons, and I've never had any interest in knowing more.

That will all change today.

I glance at my watch. There are still a few minutes to wait. I stamp my feet on the frozen ground, trying to keep my focus where it needs to be, but the heavier the silence in the forest falls, the louder the word echoes in my ears.

_Run._

There are two voices now, one a plea and the other a warning, a stereophonic siren call, tantalising and forbidden in my ears.

Is this how these vampires, these "Cullens", will feel when my scent wafts across the meadow to ignite their thirst?

They've trained themselves, Billy told me, to feed on the blood of animals, when what they crave is something far richer. It's the only way they can live with themselves, Billy said. They deny their thirst and instead, survive in a world of pain and sacrifice.

I did that, too, once.

I've taken chances again and again with Bella's safety. It strikes me like a blow that these soulless, heartless creatures are stronger than me, in ways far more important than mere physical strength.

I'm on the other side now. I've given in to that craving once already. I gave in to my need to have my wife and daughter here, with me.

I wonder, as I wait, if the vampires will succumb today, as I did, and if I'll give in again. If they do, will they remember with perfect clarity, as I do, the nature of the pain that drove them to it?

I try to shake it off; to stamp my boots so it all falls to the ground - the clinging heaviness, the film on my skin, the ball in my belly, the weight of my limbs – but nothing can shut it down.

It's one thing to quiet a whisper, another to silence a roar.

_Run._

~~~ O ~~~

A single howl in the distance and Billy's hackles rise. He growls, long and low, pacing and turning, and the sound is taken up by every Quileute in the meadow as they rise. The rumbling vibrates through my chest and Harry grabs my forearm, his bony fingers gripping tightly.

"Here they come."

I don't see them approach, and my first look at them is nothing more than a glimpse between the rows of Quileute. Two heads; one dark and one fair, and a third, black haired and much smaller.

The Quileute fall silent and Billy stands poised, his nose pointed toward the three figures. There is not a sound, not a movement in the forest.

It's this unnatural absence of sound that triggers the fresh surge of adrenaline screaming through my veins. Flight or fight, it screams, but I'm tethered to the ground, incapable of either. My heart lurches into a chaotic, disorderly beat and my lungs feel like I'm inhaling water instead of air. I breathe deeply through my nose, trying to calm a body at war with itself.

Over and through the rows of Quileute, the figures across the meadow hear every missed beat and catch-up flutter, every erratic thump and pulse of my heart. I hate that they know how my heart beats but even though they hear the fear, I won't let them see it. I clench my fists at my sides, lock my jaw and set my eyes.

My scent is masked by the double wall of Quileute before me, and on a signal from Billy, the first row begins to move away. With loping grace and military precision, they peel off, one by one from each end, to line the perimeter of the meadow.

Billy paces on a short circuit, two paces up and two paces down, just inches in front of me. With only one line of Quileute separating us, I can see their faces now, deathly pale in the morning shadows and as still as the mountains they've come from. All three are staring straight at me, their golden eyes unblinking.

The waiting feels endless as Billy prowls around me, until finally, he's satisfied, and the remaining row of Quileute before us begins their slow procession. One by one, every step slow and deliberate, they join their brothers lining the meadow. The air seems to thin with every step they take and I breathe slow and deep as the last two move off.

All that separates us now is an expanse of frozen ground, and Billy, and I get my first real look at a vampire.

Three pale faces, ghoulish and inhuman, stare back at me. Any color on their faces is exaggerated against their bloodless skin, the red slash of mouth and dark brows seem painted on. I know, now, what my nightmares will look like tonight.

My hand goes to my pocket, searching for the rosary beads. An image of my mother and her haunted eyes flashes briefly, pressing the beads into my hand every time I left for the meadow, her voice urgent at my ear.

_They're the devil, Charlie, _she'd say,_ the devil._

And here they are, devils all three, dressed in blue jeans and t-shirts. It's as though Lucifer himself stands before me, clothed in the stolen robes of Saint Michael.

The black haired female has restless eyes that move from Harry to Billy to me and back again. A deep frown twists her face as those eyes, golden as Harry said, dart back and forth.

One male, the tallest of the three, stares straight at me, his expression unreadable and the third, the blond, looks impossibly, inexplicably at ease.

A whisper of breeze, not even enough to stir the trees, drifts across the meadow. I brace myself. For a moment, nothing, and then the two darker haired sway backward, as though that gentle breath of air carries the force of something much stronger. Billy's hackles rise and his low snarl echoes across the meadow. The Quileute inch closer, drawing in from the edges of the clearing, but the vampires stand unmoved.

We wait, the tension strung tighter than a bow, and then the blond one speaks.

"I'm Carlisle Cullen," he says. He gestures to the figures either side of him. "This is Edward," he says, "and Alice. And you're Charlie Swan."

He smiles, and all I can see are gleaming teeth. The shudder that rips through my body is so violent it must be visible, even to them. I don't reply. I can't. It's Harry who speaks.

"Yes," he says, gruffly, "this is Charlie."

For a moment I worry that this Carlisle Cullen is going to launch into a speech, slink a little deeper under the fragile shell of humanity by exchanging pleasantries about the weather, but he just nods. Harry sighs next to me.

"You OK, Charlie?"

"I'm fine," I say. "Let's just get on with it."

All through the conversation that follows, I stare unflinching at those vampires. More than anything I want to look away, to count the leaves on the trees behind them or catalogue the grains of sand at my feet, but I cannot tear my eyes away. Harry and these vampires talk of arbitrary lines in the forest and terms of the treaty and it all feels nothing less than ridiculous to me. It's absurd to speak of producing a document that we will all sign to formalise these arrangements.

The adrenaline has faded and now I just feel tired. I want, so much, for all this to just end. I feel myself drift away, my vision blurring, until the three faces across the meadow morph into one. The bodiless head dances before my eyes like some grotesque Kabuki mask, its exaggerated features sharp and bold against a stark white background.

I blink and shake my head, trying to focus on what Harry is saying, and when I do, my vision sharpens in a heartbeat.

"…. be careful when you go into Forks," he's saying.

"Wait," I say, my voice too loud. "They are not to come into town. They absolutely are not ever to come into Forks. Harry, I can't believe you are even discussing this." I give him a hard look, a warning. _Bella_.

The three figures exchange glances and it's the blond one who speaks.

"I understand your distrust of us," he says. He waves a hand at the other two. "We all do. There's nothing we can say to convince you that we will honor any treaty, any parameters that are agreed to, but if those parameters include no human contact, there's very little point in us staying here."

"Charlie," Harry says, before I can say a word, the warning clear now in his voice.

"Why here?" I ask.

"There aren't many places with a climate like yours," the blond one says, with a glance upward to a sky obscured by grey clouds. "It's as simple as that."

"It's too dangerous for you to be in the town," I say, shaking my head. "I can't allow it."

"You're in more danger than you know." It's the tall one who speaks this time, exuding such an air of arrogance it makes my lip curl.

"What are you talking about?" Harry says.

"There are laws within our world," the tall one says, "strict rules, enforced by a council in Italy. If they – the Volturi – became aware you know of the existence of our kind, there would be swift and deadly punishment."

Harry snorts, trying to hold himself a little taller. "We'd take them."

"No," he says, glaring at Harry, "you wouldn't. The Volturi are powerful and merciless. Make no mistake, you wouldn't survive an attack from them. Especially," he says, looking at me, "given the nature of your blood. The Volturi have no self control."

And just like that, it's over. They've played Harry right from the start. His meaning is clear and unmistakable. Agree to our terms or we unleash the Volturi.

There's still a chance for Bella, though. I can still try and get her out now, today, before –

The tall one speaks again. "This is not a threat. It's not even a warning." He shrugs. "It's just information. If they hear of you and Bella, it won't be from us."

I freeze, locking my knees so I don't stagger and fall.

"What did you just say?" I hiss. The words come out between teeth clenched so tight I wonder they don't shatter.

_Bella_.

They know about Bella.

I am three strides across the meadow before Billy even registers what I'm doing.

"Don't you dare ever speak of my daughter again," I snarl. I am completely unhinged, broken apart and seething, marching toward these vampires like this is some barroom brawl I have a hope of winning. "Don't you _dare_ ever use her name again."

Billy is snarling at my feet, desperately trying to stop me from getting any closer but I walk straight ahead as though he's not even there. I have a vague sense of the forest closing in around me, and a moment later we are surrounded by Quileute in a tight circle, with only Billy separating me from the three vampires.

The tall one speaks again, his words all the more chilling for the clipped clarity of his diction. "We're not yet completely used to your blood," he says. "Please move back now."

I square my shoulders and raise my chin, but that's the only move I make. I can't take this charade a moment longer. I want Harry to see what he's done, what his collusion with these demons will unleash on the innocent people of Forks, what's he's turning loose on my daughter.

_Come on, you evil fuck, show yourself. Come at me._

But he doesn't move.

No one does but Billy, and the move he makes is so shocking, I can't believe what I'm seeing.

He phases right before my eyes, and in one swift movement, scoops a rock from the ground and drags it with force along his forearm.

Blood pours from the open wound as he stands between me and the vampires. They crouch and hiss, the Quileute snap and strain and Harry shouts a plea to them, to me, to Billy. Nobody moves and the moment stretches on until the only sound is the soft splash of blood as it hits the ground, drop by drop.

"Look at you," I say, my voice no more than a whisper, "eyes black as night, teeth bared. You'd go for my throat in a heartbeat."

I stand a little taller. The fragile veil has been stripped away and their true natures, with all their inhuman brutality, are revealed.

"Your thin veneer of civility doesn't hold up under much, does it?" I say, looking from one to the other. It's the look in the eyes of the tall one that draws me and holds me, mesmerised. He takes in the scene before him; the naked man covered in blood, the circle of beasts snarling, and me. It's me his eyes linger on.

I see recognition in those black eyes, as though he understands the exact nature of my torment. He looks upon me with empathy, this Edward Cullen, and his voice rings with a note of understanding I can barely stand to hear.

"No," he says, quietly, "it doesn't. We have that in common at least."

~~~ O ~~~

I drive, jolting over the trail in the woods, with Harry next to me. Billy sits in the back, nursing his injured arm. I've never wished a man dead before, but if the power of thought was enough to do it, Harry Clearwater would be buried deep on James Island before nightfall.

"You told them," I say. "Jesus Christ, Harry, you told them about Bella."

"What?" he says. "No, Charlie, no."

"Come on, Harry. How else could they know? My God, what a game you're playing with my daughter's life."

"He didn't," Billy says with quietly, his eyes never leaving the track. "I was there every time he's met with the Cullens. It wasn't us."

"How, then? How could they possibly know about her blood?"

"I don't know," Harry says. "Truly, I don't. A guess, maybe? It's logical. She's your daughter."

She's my daughter, cursed with this blood that poisons everything good, and colors every moment darker than it should be.

"We think of them as savages," Harry says, "as beasts with no human thought or endeavour. But I keep telling you, Charlie, these ones are different. They're building a house up there in the mountains, a beautiful house, with their own hands. They read books and play music. They're different."

"Jesus," I say. For the first time I really begin to take in what he means when he says that.

"We know so little about them," Harry says. "We know how to kill them and not much more. We don't even know how they become what they are. We can learn from these ones, if we're smart, and if we're patient."

His voice cracks on the last word. Time is running out for Harry and he knows it as well as I do. Patience is not something he has time for.

"You heard the threat, Charlie, as clearly as I did. It wasn't my doing, but there's no escape from it now. The Cullens are here to stay, and so is Bella."

~~~ O ~~~

Sue rushes out, fussing over Harry, helping him out of the car, pressing her palm to his cheek, his arm, his back. She sees Billy's arm and her face pales.

"Oh my God, Billy!" she says. "What happened out there?" Her questioning eyes dart from Harry to me. How is it possible, she's thinking, that he has an unhealed wound?

"I'm alright," Billy says. She looks unconvinced but takes Harry by the arm anyway, murmuring in his ear as she leads him slowly inside.

Billy leans against his truck, hands in his pockets, waiting. The blood has dried black on his skin, the jagged line running from wrist to forearm.

"That hurt?" I ask. He shrugs. If it does, it won't for long. He'll phase as soon as I'm gone and his arm will heal in minutes.

Words hang between us, unspoken and unnecessary. If I thanked him every time he saved me there'd be no time for anything else, and he doesn't want it anyway. The words drift away like the curl of wood smoke from Harry's chimney.

I glance at the sky. The clouds hang low overhead, more black now than grey, shrouding the mountaintops in mist. Those vampires are up there somewhere, hidden in that murky netherworld.

I can't seem to give it up yet. I can't believe it's really come to this. Knowing the answer before I ask, I grasp at the last straw.

"I guess I'll head home," I say, still squinting at the clouds. "Go for a run maybe."

Billy opens the door to his truck and climbs in, peering through the window at the mountains.

"I wouldn't if I was you," he replies, closing the door and turning his dark eyes on me. "That storm in the mountains is coming down." He turns on the engine and drives away, ice and mud flying behind him.

There's cotton wool where my brain should be. Nothing penetrates for a while except for an unexpected feeling of kinship with Bella. She's trapped here under the clouds now, just as I've always been. It's more than just that though. Harry has been keeping things from me for years, while I lived oblivious to it. This time it's different. This time I know he's lying. Billy's dead, flat eyes told me that. There's a truth here somewhere, I know it, but still I can't see it.

I begin to understand how Bella feels.

The wind picks up, bringing with it the first misty wash of rain down from the mountains. The column of wood smoke from Harry's house drifts away on the breeze, and the curtain twitches at his window.

I hear the rain before I feel it, a dull roar in the distance, getting louder as it comes at me. The shadows deepen and the clouds burst over me as I stand alone in Harry's yard. I turn my face to the heavens as the meadow is washed off my skin, the rain stinging my face like the cold point of a needle. The rain clears my head and allows the truth in, flowing like ice through my veins, flashing before my eyes in a series of prophetic vignettes.

Bella in her truck, stopped at a red light as a car eases up behind her; a blond head and golden eyes, turning black as he recognises the faded red paintwork.

A small, black-haired figure, her glinting smile cut with razor sharp teeth as she passes my wife in the street.

This is no longer just a preview of my nightmares. This is cold, hard, reality in living, breathing, three dimensional technicolor. This is my life now.

Nothing can wash away the truth of it.

Nothing can change these three things.

The Cullens are here to stay.

So is Renee.

And so is Bella.

The trinity that I would do anything to keep apart now seem destined to cross paths.

Mother, daughter, and those unholy spirits.

~ O ~

Thank you so much for reading x


	9. Chapter 9

Annetteinoz, Lizf22 & Alby Mangroves. I'm a very, very lucky girl.

Disclaimer: It's all Stephenie Meyer's.

~~~ Bella ~~~

I've slept through the alarm again. Even so, I lie for a few more sleepy moments, nestled deep in the warmth of my purple quilt. I wonder how late I'll be this time. Last night I ironed and packed my work clothes in my school bag, but I couldn't find the top I wanted to wear to school today. I haven't seen it for days. I toss the quilt off, thinking hard, while I race around brushing my hair and throwing clothes on.

That red top must be somewhere.

The last time I remember seeing it was on my first afternoon at the store. Mike led me to a musty corner in the back to show me where I could get changed out of my school clothes. Tucked behind the tiny kitchenette was a shabby privacy curtain, hanging crookedly from a drooping wire. I left my school bag there after I'd changed into the khaki shirt. Mike explained that the cost of the shirt would be taken out of my first pay, plus extra for the embroidery. "Newton's Camping Goods", it says, in bright yellow thread across the pocket.

My first job.

Mike showed me how to check off new stock and how to stack the shelves. I'm not trusted to work the cash register yet, but I helped one customer while Mike was busy with another. He came into the store during that first shift, a tall stranger with a shock of light brown hair and pale skin. He wasn't tall enough though, or pale enough. Or _strange _enough. He isn't the one keeping me awake nights.

This boy was just a boy. Sweat beaded his upper lip and his shifty, darting eyes were never still for a second. He offered me his clammy hand, introducing himself as Riley, and I was struck, as his hand gripped mine, at the complete absence of feeling during that brief contact. How is it that the touch of one hand can feel so different to the touch of another? I tried so hard not to hope that I would ever feel that other, singular touch again, but I felt it. Then and now, constantly, I long to feel that burn again.

Riley seemed more interested in me than in the down jacket he was looking to buy, peppering me with questions while he shrugged in and out of different styles and sizes, listening intently to my answers. I was relieved when Mike took over, but still he lurked furtively for a while, even after he'd handed his money over. He was peculiar, and even though it seems unlikely, I wonder now if he left with more than just the jacket.

I rush downstairs to the kitchen. Charlie and Renee stand huddled together at the coffee pot, leaping apart like scalded cats as I enter. Charlie fumbles with the filter, his ears red, but Renee is braver, turning to face me. It's like this all the time now; whispers behind every door and stolen glances around every corner. Whatever goes on in this house, I'm not a part of it, not connected to it, to them. Not anymore.

"Morning," I mumble, grabbing a granola bar with one hand, and my school bag with the other.

"Hi, Bella," my mother says with a glance at the clock, her voice too loud, her smile too bright. "You're going to be late."

I nod. I know that. "I have work after school so I'll be late home."

"OK," she says. I stand there in the doorway, hitching my bag higher on my shoulder, looking from one to the other. The wrapper on the granola bar crackles between my fingers, and my mother and father shuffle and stare at the floor. It's obvious they want me gone, out of the house, out of the way, so they can talk without me around.

I try to stand tall, but I can't. That small taste of freedom when we first got here, when I felt untethered from the burden of my mother's loneliness, was short-lived. That burden rests on me again, heavy on my shoulders and in my heart, but in a way that I never could have predicted. It's my loneliness now that weighs me down.

I take one last, hurried look through the laundry hamper before I head out the door. Like my mother's painting during the darkest days in Phoenix, falsely bright and cheerful, I'm drawn to that red top.

I would wear it every day now, if only I could find it.

~~~ O ~~~

The drink flasks make a satisfying metallic clunk each time one knocks against another. Mike leans on the shelf as I stack them, his blue eyes bright in his earnest face.

"Business isn't usually this slow, Bella, but if your father doesn't lift this warning soon, I'm not sure if Mom and Dad can keep you on." He rubs his fingers up and down the side of his nose. "Mom wanted me to tell you, so it wouldn't be a shock if we have to let you go."

"Sure, Mike. I understand". I think his mother probably wants me to know so that I can exert some pressure on my father to lift the warning. That is something that won't be happening, but I don't tell him that.

"It comes from the Quileute, you know," he says. "They see these animals – mountain lions this time – in the forest close to town and they let Chief Swan know. It used to happen all the time, but not so much lately." He sighs. "I know your father has a … history, a reason for being jumpy but Mom and Dad are really worried. I mean, everybody who sets foot in the forest knows there are dangerous animals in it." He shrugs. "Businesses like ours can go out of -." He trails off and when I look up at him, his eyes are wide. He's staring at something – or someone - right behind me.

I turn around, slowly, and there he is, tall and lean and staring at me.

Mike clears his throat. "Can I help you?" he asks. The tall figure in front of me looks deadly, like something wild and ready to strike, not so much as glancing in Mike's direction.

"Can I speak to you alone, please?" His voice is deep and strained, his hands clenched in fists at his sides.

"Um, Bella, are you OK with…" Mike says, waving a hand in the direction of the tall figure. Those murderous eyes shift from me to Mike, the glare intensifying. Mike turns beet red, dropping his eyes to the floor.

"Sure, Mike, of course. I won't be long."

I can't tear my eyes from the figure in front of me and as Mike slouches off, that intense stare shifts back to me. He's paler than he seemed in Port Angeles, and his hair is lighter than I remember. His eyes are lighter too, a golden color I have never seen before, nothing like the black they were in Port Angeles. He stands so rigid and so still, contained and controlled, but his hair is a crazy, reckless mess. It's as though whatever it is he's restraining is unleashed at the top of his head, and everything wild and untamed bursts free.

He doesn't speak, and I don't think I can. Mike scuffles around in the back of the shop, making his presence felt. A car drives by outside, and the clock over the counter ticks loudly, but neither of us say a word. I know if I don't say something soon, he'll disappear again, and, more than anything, I want him to stay. I blurt out the first thing that comes to mind.

"What's your name?"

He startles. The frown deepens, those strange, mesmerising eyes locked on mine.

"Edward Cullen," he says. It seems to take a great effort to get those two words out. His fists pump, rhythmically locking and unlocking in time with the pulse hammering in my throat.

I think, inexplicably, of a magazine I leafed through last week while waiting to get my hair trimmed. Under a gaudy pink banner that read "Stars Without Make-up" there were photos of movie stars shopping for groceries or leaving the gym, looking washed out and tired, just like everybody else. Next to each photo was another, a studio shot of the same person, this time with make-up and airbrushing, so that they looked nothing like real people at all.

Edward Cullen doesn't look like a real person. He is beautiful but still entirely masculine, flawless and compelling, but this isn't some artfully lit Hollywood studio. This is just Newton's Camping Goods in Forks, Washington on a rainy Tuesday afternoon.

"Who are you?" I whisper.

There is no reply, just the smallest twitch of mouth and shoulder, a shrug and a grimace.

A warning.

Not that question.

I don't have any others just now, so I wait, hoping he'll speak. Even Mike is quiet, and everything else fades and retreats until there is only this single dusty shelf and this silent, hypnotic boy.

"Your fall," he says, quietly. "Are you OK?"

"I'm fine, just that little…" My hand burns where his finger touched my skin. "I'm fine."

"Your head? Concussion? Headaches?" The words are ground out between teeth clenched so tightly, it must be painful. My fingers twitch. I want to rub my thumb over his jaw until he relaxes enough to speak in more than a few strangled words.

"No, my head's fine."

He scowls and his eyes dart to the back of the shop where Mike lurks, and then rest on mine again. He doesn't seem inclined to say anything more, and my heart rate spikes, driven high on a wave of panic. I want to know everything, and I don't want him to leave, and I think I will end up with neither.

My gaze drifts briefly to his mouth and lower still to his fists, their rhythm faster. I take a breath, take a risk. He's leaving anyway, any second. I can feel it.

I want to know.

"My hand is fine too," I say. "There was barely even a scratch." I watch him closely, testing him. "There was just that little bit of blood." Immediately his eyes drop to my throat, and I'm suddenly acutely aware of the pulse that beats there. Those eyes glaze over, and I watch spellbound as they darken, the gold deepening into darkest midnight black, lit with a wicked gleam.

"Your eyes…." I breathe. His hands still, and the blazing gaze intensifies. A moan from some tortured place deep inside him falls from his lips. I want, so badly, to reach my hand out and touch his face, to feel his skin, to know if he's as cold as I remember.

But when I move, my fingers grasp at nothing but a fading hiss in the space where he stood.

Mike is at my side in an instant, appearing from whatever corner he's been watching from.

"Who was that?" he asks. "How'd he disappear like that?"

I don't answer. I make a small gesture, as I pick up a drink flask and continue stacking.

A shrug and a grimace.

Not that question.

_~~~ O ~~~_

"You're late, Bella." My mother is at the kitchen sink, washing her hands. She blows a lock of hair from her face, and turns to me, drying her hands on a cloth. "I was worried."

"I was finishing up some things at school," I say.

I hold my ground under her long, searching look, relieved when she turns back to the sink. Even though it's the truth, it's not the whole truth, and I'm sure it's written all over my face.

"Let me know next time," she says lightly. I nod, pulling the fridge door open. My mouth is suddenly as dry as a desert.

A familiar pang radiates through my chest, an echo in the empty space that was once filled with all the things we were to each other. That emptiness is bigger now, the great divide between us wider, but this time it's me who's driving the wedge deeper. That van in Port Angeles nearly killed me, and my mother knows nothing about it. I haven't said a word. A month ago, she would have been the first – and maybe the only – person I would have told about such a thing.

I close the fridge door, the carton of juice cool to my skin. I've tried to tell myself that it's their fault, _her _fault, that I've kept such a thing to myself. Maybe I was driven by some childish impulse – if you won't share you secrets with me, I'm not sharing mine with you – to stay silent, but that's not the truth of it. Not at all. It's not about nearly dying, it's not about the van. It's about who stopped it.

The juice slops onto the bench, and Renee passes me a cloth. Our fingers touch briefly, and I pull my hand away quickly, afraid she will feel all the things I'm trying to hide from her in the heat of my skin. I was at school this afternoon, that much is true, but I wasn't finishing anything. I was trying to start something.

I haven't seen Edward Cullen since his visit to Newton's, but I think that he has seen me.

I feel eyes on me, like a shiver of cold breath down my spine, everywhere I go. I am sure of it, and my behavior is strange and unsettling. I catch myself peering into the shadows outside my bedroom window at night, or stopping suddenly in the street outside Newton's to look over my shoulder, or pulling my truck over on the way to school to stare into the forest, but I never see anyone there.

Charlie stomps into the house, hangs his dripping jacket by the front door, and joins my mother and me in the kitchen. He kisses Renee and turns to me, sitting at the kitchen table, and runs his thumb and forefinger from the centre of his moustache down each side to the corner of his mouth. I look at him, really look at him, for the first time in a long time, and gasp at the sight before me.

My father does not look well. There are dark shadows under his eyes, black smudges stark against his fair skin. His hair is longer than I've ever seen it before, sticking up at haphazard angles, and he seems to have lost weight. But it's the haunted look in his eyes that frightens me the most. When did this happen? I realise with a jolt that while I've been looking away, consumed and distracted, something terrible has happened to my father.

"How was your day, Bella?" he asks mildly. I pick up an apple from the fruit bowl on the table and roll it gently between my hands, trying to hide my shock.

"Fine, thanks." I take a bite of the apple. It's dry and tasteless in my mouth. I close my eyes briefly, but even sitting down, the world feels like it's tilting.

"I drove past the school this afternoon. You were sitting in the middle of the football field on your own after school finished."

"Biology project," I say, too quickly, around the apple. "Categorizing local flora. There are all kinds of trees and plants around the field, and you don't like me going into the forest." Guilt prickles over my skin, a slow burn, and my stomach rolls. Even now, even in the midst of this concern for my father, my first instinct is to lie, to protect my secret.

His eyes narrow slightly and he worries at his moustache again. I put the apple down gently on the table, the waxy red perfection scarred by the gash of my bite mark.

"Well, let your mother or I know next time you'll be late, OK?"

"Sure," I reply. "Sorry."

He goes upstairs, his footfall slow and heavy, to change out of his uniform while Renee potters around preparing dinner.

"Mom," I say, as soon as he's gone, "just tell me one thing. Is Charlie sick?"

"What, Bella? No." She glances toward the stairs. "Bella, he's fine. There's just a lot going on with his work at the moment. Please, I don't want you to worry about him. He's fine."

I nod thoughtfully. I believed her when she told me my father isn't an addict, and I believe her now when she says he's not sick. The relief is acute, but I don't believe for a moment that the changes in him are anything to do with his work. This is Forks, not New York.

The relief turns to something else, though, something unexpected. Surprise. I'm not surprised that she's lying. I have come to expect that. What surprises me is that I'm relieved that she is.

A piece of paper, nestled now in my pocket, found its way to me today. That piece of paper changes everything, and I know, with absolute certainty, that the lies I just told my mother and father are only the beginning.

My mother's deception barely hurts at all this time.

~~~ O ~~~

The book lies open on my bed, the cover so familiar now, like an old friend. My copy of the book on the Quileute is as well thumbed as any other on my bookshelf. I lean closer to the page, running my finger under the words, rereading passages I already know by heart. The pages Renee had torn from her copy of the book are mostly about the Quileute, theories on their early deaths and stories of their legends and culture.

According to this book, the Quileute can transform into wolves. They have an inexplicable, magical ability to morph at will into beasts as large as bears, and more deadly. This information, if one is to believe it, is interesting enough, but it's the reason they can do this that really interests me. They have this gift in order to protect their people from their immortal enemy; and it's the words that describe these mythical creatures that leap from the page like bright lights on a lonely road.

_Pale and cold._

_Strength and speed._

_Superhuman._

_Supernatural._

I was sitting alone in the middle of that field this afternoon hoping that Edward Cullen would appear. It struck me this morning that if what I suspect is true, he must need to hide himself from the world, and I realised that I am almost never alone. For a few minutes in my truck driving to and from school each day, and sometimes when Renee and Charlie go to the Reservation, but mostly there are always people around me. Edward Cullen can't just come marching up to my front doorstep and ask me out for ice-cream.

So I sat alone on the field, tearing at the grass and staring at the shadows, whispering his name. Maybe he'd hear me. Maybe he'd want to talk to me too, but the longer I sat there, the more foolish I felt. I began to question everything I thought I knew about Edward Cullen, and to question my own sanity. I got up from that field, wiped the grass from the back of my jeans, and walked slowly back to my truck.

And when I unlocked the door and climbed in, there was a scrap of folded paper on the passenger seat.

A hesitant knock startles me. Charlie clears his throat on the other side of the door, and I shove the book quickly under my quilt. He knocks again, this time with purpose. Three short, sharp raps.

"Come in," I call.

He enters, just barely, leaning on the doorframe, looking around the room. I'm not sure he's even been in here since the day we painted it. It feels like a lifetime ago.

"So," he says, "I just…. wanted to talk to you." He rubs a hand along the back of his neck, twisting his head and cracking the bones. Renee's music drifts up the stairs, and he closes the door gently. My eyes slide down in a furtive glance. One corner of the book peeks out from under the quilt. Charlie walks to the window, opening the curtains an inch or two, peering out, and I cover the book over quickly.

"So," he says, his back still to me, "you've made some friends here, Bella? The kids at school treating you OK?"

"Yeah, sure," I reply. "The kids at school are great."

He doesn't mention Jake and Emily, and I'm glad. By some unspoken mutual agreement, they have withdrawn from me, and I from them. I haven't seen or heard from Emily since that night at La Push, when she lied to me about the strange people who live in that strange place. I run into Jake sometimes though. He seems to be in Forks a lot lately. We exchange a few passing words, but I haven't been to see him at La Push for a while now. There's nothing there for me.

"Do you miss your friends in Phoenix much?" Charlie asks.

"Yeah, I miss them but we keep in touch." I shrug, my knee bouncing, wishing he'd get to the point.

"Friendship," he says, with a sigh. "It can be a strange thing. There are people I've known all my life, and I still don't really _know_ them." He shrugs. "People probably feel the same way about me. You know what I mean." He says it not as a question, but as a statement, and he's right. I do know. I know exactly what he means.

"I just -," he sighs. "Jesus, Bella, I just know how you feel, OK? I understand, and I just wanted you to know that. There are people who I've trusted all my life, and they're doing things now that I just don't understand."

He walks to the door, pausing with his hand on the doorknob.

"I just didn't realise how hard it was, Bella," he says. He seems to be talking more to himself now, than to me, his voice low and tight. "I just have to keep trusting them," he says. "I don't know what else to do."

~~~ O ~~~

I sit on my bed, unfinished homework strewn everywhere, snapping the rings on my binder open and closed in a steady rhythm. The lock on my car makes exactly the same type of satisfying click. I know I heard that sound this afternoon.

The piece of paper, the fine blue script stark against the crisp white background, is perched on my knee. I run my fingers over the writing. I turn it over and feel the ridges on the back, hold it up to the light, squinting. There is a cell phone number written on that piece of paper, a number that could mean anything; an invitation, a question or a command.

I think of the few words that have passed between Edward Cullen and me. I remember each one of them. There have not been many, but the ones that have fallen from his lips have been words of polite enquiry and concern.

All but one word, that is.

That red spot on my skin is long healed. It was barely even there to begin with, just a tiny speck, but still, it has told me everything I need to know. Edward Cullen said it himself in a single word as he held me on that cold road in Port Angeles.

_Blood._

My cell phone is on my other knee, balanced precariously on a limb that quivers with nervous energy. My fingers hover over the keys, trembling and twitching, as they have done a dozen times this evening. I've gotten as far as keying the number in, but no further than that. The right words have eluded me until now, but now that I have them, I know what to do. There will be no call made. I know I wouldn't be able to say the words out loud, but I can type them. I punch the keys in a sudden rush, my fingers trembling and clumsy. Even so, it doesn't take long.

There are only five words, just five syllables. So little, to say so much.

I hold my breath and send those words off, imagining the letters flying through the ether, jumbled and nonsensical, only to reassemble at the other end. I whisper a prayer as they fly -not to God though, not for this. I send those words with a wish and a hope, borne of breathless desperation and wretched loneliness, offered up to whoever might listen to such a thing.

_Please, _I whisper, _please, don't let him deny it._

And then I wait.

~~~ O ~~~

I stare at the screen on my phone willing the chime to sound, until the words blur and flare. I feel dizzy. I look away, blink, and look back again. The words are still there, glowing in the sent items.

_I know what you are._

Only an hour has passed since I sent that message, and already I wish I could take it back. There has been no response. Not a word.

The curtain billows against my open window, and a lone wolf howls in the distance. I wonder, not for the first time, about Jake. I could just as easily have sent that message to him. If I'm right about Edward Cullen, if the clues in that book have helped lead me to the truth about him, what does that mean for the Quileute? Could the book be right about them too? The longer my phone lies silent, the less likely it seems that I'm right about anything.

The minutes tick by, each one feeling like an hour. Charlie and Renee murmur a muffled goodnight through my closed door, and my voice sounds too loud when I reply. The branch at my window scratches at the glass, a rhythmical scrape-scrape, scrape-scrape in time with my heartbeat. But my phone is silent.

The curtain sags against the window as the wind dies, and I sit frozen for a long moment, trying to understand what I'm hearing. There is no breeze now, not the faintest breath, but the branch still scrapes and grinds on the glass.

I stare at the window, my heart beating faster.

The noise at my window keeps time.

I slide off my bed and creep across my bedroom floor, knees bent and eyes narrowed. Hope flutters like a tiny bird and I try so hard not to let it fly.

It can't be.

My shaking hand draws the curtain back from the window.

It is.

Black eyes in a pale face stare back at me.

At first I think he's floating there, that thought more unsettling than the fact that he's here at all. A shiver runs down my spine, but as he moves the leaves rustle around him, and I realise he's balanced in the tree.

His face is all shadows and angles and eyes black as night, and when he moves it's with great care. Slowly, as though underwater, his arm reaches toward me. For one endless, breathless moment I think he's going to touch my face, and I long to feel the burn of those cool fingers again. But, no. His hand comes to rest on the open window and very gently, the note of warning clear in every controlled movement, he pushes it closed.

I move back a little so my breath doesn't cloud the glass.

He looks down at something in his hands and I peer through the glass to see what it is. A cell phone. I glance down at my own hand, where my phone is clasped tightly, and switch it quickly to silent. A second later a vibration hums in my palm.

_I want to talk to you,_ his message says, _but not like this._

I look up. His eyebrows are raised in question. The glass, the phone, the barriers. Not like this. I nod.

Another message.

_It will be dangerous._

A quick gesture as he mouths the words. _For you._

Again, I nod. I know.

The phone vibrates again against my palm.

_Can you keep a secret?_

I nod again.

_Yes._

_Can you be patient?_

_Yes._

_You mustn't push, Bella._

My eyes snap up, my head cocked. How can one word, my name on the screen, put there by him, elicit such a sinful thrill? There is the ghost of a smile at one corner of his mouth, and I look down as the phone vibrates again.

_Bella, _he says. _Your name is Bella._

There is a long silence, an interlude in which wonderful things happen. I concentrate hard, so I remember every one of them. Feelings with very grown-up names blossom and bloom in my stomach, and on my skin, and in my heart. I work hard trying to hide them, but he is braver than me. As I gaze, committing to memory the curve of his lips and the look in his eye, the mask falls. Tenderness softens his face, and he doesn't seem like a wild thing anymore. I catch a glimpse of what lies beneath, and he just looks like this boy I know, just Edward Cullen.

Slowly – again, so slowly - he raises a hand. His face is both a question and a warning, and I don't move. I promised him I would be patient. His hand comes to rest on the window, his palm pressed flat on the cold, hard glass between us. He's very close now, even with the barrier separating us, and I move closer too. He watches, transfixed, as my hand moves to rest against the window, lined up with his.

He looks younger now as he gazes back at me, maybe close to my own age, and I begin to hope for things I'm sure I shouldn't. These unfamiliar feelings begin to whisper, and then to roar for action, and my breath comes quickly, clouding the glass and obscuring his face. I realise with a start that the glass is unmarked where his breath should be. I watch his chest for a long moment, but there's no movement. None at all. I don't think he's breathing. My eyes snap to his and his face has changed. The mask has snapped back into place, frightening and thrilling, and the moment passes. His hand drops.

I know he'll vanish any second, disappearing to who knows where, and the knowledge sends a shiver down my spine. I feel his loss before he's even gone. I look down, fingers moving quickly over the keys, before it's too late. I have a promise of my own to ask for.

_Please, whatever happens, please don't lie to me._

My eyes scan his, longing for a sign, a nod, anything. _Please,_ I whisper. He moves closer still, his face so close to mine and his head inclines minutely, the smallest gesture. It's enough.

My head bows briefly to my phone again. I don't want to push it but I have to know.

_Have you been watching me?_

Again a nod, almost imperceptible, but there nonetheless.

I can't help it. I smile with relief. I haven't imagined those eyes burning from the shadows. My smile drops though, as I take in his expression. He looks fierce, not at all pleased with my reaction.

The phone vibrates in my hand once more, his final question, the warning plain in his gleaming eyes and in the words on my cell phone.

_What am I?_

I meet those eyes, midnight black, and mouth the word, slow and clear. It's an unmistakeable word, a word like no other.

_Vampire._

He nods slowly.

His head is cocked slightly, chin down, his eyes pinned to mine as though he's barely, just barely, hanging on. Whatever it is I do to him, whatever it is that draws him to me, he's coming to the end of his will to control it. He seems to hum and shimmer on the other side of that window, and I feel his concentration drifting away. Suddenly, his eyes drop to my throat, and a wicked glint flashes in those eyes. And then, in a movement so swift it makes my head spin, he vanishes.

I wait until the tree stills before I open the window again. I stand there for a long time, gazing through the leaves, trying to see what lies beyond. A sense of calm and belonging settles over me, and I feel both sleepy and awake, and entirely unwilling to move.

It's hours later when the phone, still clutched in my palm, vibrates one more time.

_Rest now, Bella. Go to sleep. _ _I promise I'll be back tomorrow._

Only then do I crawl into bed, fully clothed and more tired than I have ever been, to sleep the hours away.

~ O ~

Thanks as always for reading xx


	10. Chapter 10

As always, big thanks to Liz, Alby & Annette – they give the best advice and make it all better.

Stephenie Meyer owns all of it.

~~~ Bella ~~~

The ocean wind whips off the water and onto the beach, spraying sand into my tangled hair and stinging my eyes. Angela and I huddle deeper into our jackets, squinting at the three figures way out on the choppy swell.

It's a miserable day for surfing, and I wonder that Jessica, Mike and Ben don't admit defeat and paddle in. They've been out there for nearly an hour without a breaker in sight, bobbing on the endless gray sea. Angela and I give up and climb into my warm truck, chewing on red licorice while she talks about graduation and college. I make all the right noises, listening half-heartedly, but the greater part of my mind is far away.

The struggle to fight off the fear is constant and exhausting, a dogged shadow that trails after me everywhere I go. I can't shake it no matter how hard I try, but it's the nagging sensation that I'm mostly afraid of the wrong things that's even harder to shake. Grainy images of coffins and dark dungeons underground, of murderous fangs on white throated maidens and bed sheets stained with red linger at the edges of my thoughts, but I don't allow them in. He is not that, at least not to me.

Not yet, anyway.

I brush those thoughts away, reminding myself that his intentions have been made clear over and over, every single night at my window. He appears there, like an apparition in the darkness, silent and solemn, and with painstaking care, has opened that window a little wider each night. I have to believe that these aren't the actions of one who means me harm, and I do not wish him away. The opposite, in fact, is what I fear the most. Every night when he disappears, whether to coffin or dungeon or hole in the ground, I am desperately afraid that he will never return.

Angela catches my attention, and I'm thrown for a moment as the thoughts in my head come out of her mouth. "I'll wait for him, of course," she's saying. "I'd wait for him forever, but I really hope it doesn't come to that." She chews on a fingernail, her eyebrows drawn together. "I really hope we can get into the same college."

"You love him, don't you?" I ask. "I mean _really _love him."

She smiles broadly. "I do. I really do."

This is not something we've ever talked about before, but the warm intimacy of this small space makes it somehow easier to ask. "How does it feel, to love someone like that?"

She smiles widely. "Oh, Bella, it's the most wonderful thing. I just like him so much, as well as loving him." She shrugs. "It's just easy. Uncomplicated." She narrows her eyes, gazing beyond the windshield to the rolling ocean beyond. "We studied space in Mr Banner's class last year. The universe is constantly expanding, he told us, and I couldn't comprehend it, no matter how he tried to explain it. How can something that's endless and limitless get _bigger_?"

She takes her glasses off, wipes the lenses on her jacket, and puts them back on. "Ben was in the seat behind me, and he leaned over and whispered in my ear. "Like love", he said, and I understood then. I think there can't be anymore space left in me to love him anymore than I already do, but then every day, all the time, I love him more. That's how it feels to me anyway." She stares out the window for a moment longer, pensive and serene, and then laughs quietly. "Romance for nerds," she says, with a pretty blush. "I don't know how to explain it, Bella, I just know it's the most wonderful thing ever."

She chatters away happily, talking of their plans for the future, and I drift away again.

_I want to talk to you._

I cling to that phrase, to the message that he sent me the first night at my window. I've staked everything on those words. I try to apply logic to a situation that defies it at every turn, applying sense and reason to this strange reality when it's far beyond the realms of both. Surely if he wanted to kill me, he'd have done it by now. It's cold comfort though, when there are other dark deeds that may be on his mind. Will I be like the girls I've seen on those shows on TV, with scarves wrapped around their anaemic throats to hide the bite marks?

No.

_No._

He wants to talk.

I don't know why or what he wants to say or if that's even the truth. There has been no more conversation through the window, just a strange game of silent waiting as the inches slowly open up between us. I know, of course, that there can be no future for us together, certainly not the kind that Angela speaks of, anyway. Maybe if he climbs through my bedroom window tonight, I'll have no future at all.

But still, he said it.

He said it.

He wants to talk to me.

And he's the only one who does.

Angela leans over, searching for the switch to the windshield wipers, her hands groping blindly at the dashboard. It's raining now, a misty drizzle that colors the world a dull, leaden gray. I flick the switch for her and the salty raindrops are wiped away, revealing the three forlorn figures on the choppy sea.

The horizon has disappeared into the watery sky, but a few bands of white appear nearer to the shore now. The long awaited breakers form from the shapeless swell, and Ben is on his feet, riding one in. Angela sits upright, clutching my arm, and then hangs out the door whistling and hooting with glee as Ben makes it almost to the shoreline. She shoves the bag of candy into my hand and sprints to the beach, throws herself into Ben's arms as he staggers ashore and they collapse together, a mass of tangled limbs and wet sand and happiness in the rain.

Last night, for the first time, Edward Cullen opened the window the whole way and nothing but the cold night air stood between us. I waited breathless, certain that his ritual leave-taking would surely follow. Every night it's the same; his jaw clenches and his eyes darken, and then those eyes drop to my throat, and he is gone. But last night was different. He stayed for long, breathless minutes once that window was open, his face framed by the dark leaves and then, suddenly, he _breathed_.

He didn't stay for long after that, but before he left he uttered the first words he's spoken to me since that afternoon at Newton's.

"Tomorrow," he said. "I'm ready now."

I've fought the ambiguity of those words all day. I pull my cell phone out of my pocket and read his message from that first night, one more time.

He said it. He did.

_I want to talk to you._

Jessica and Mike have made it out of the water now too, the four figures barely visible in the misty gray world. I lean on the horn, a short, sharp blast, and when they look up, I point over my shoulder and wave. The afternoon is wearing on and there's something I need to do before night falls.

I've seen those shows on TV.

I'll stop in at Newtons on the way home and buy a long, red scarf, just in case.

~~~ O ~~~

Dinner is finished early tonight, and the kitchen is cleared away. I flick the light off as I pass by, a futile gesture to try and hurry the darkness along. Renee and Charlie are curled up in front of the television, settled under a halo of lamplight, eating ice cream. I go upstairs to wash the sand out of my hair and finish my homework.

The ticking of the clock on my nightstand is the only music I listen to anymore, the metronome beat the perfect soundtrack for waiting. The ticking soothes me, proving that time is not, in fact, standing still. I know it's too early, but still I listen for that other sound, for that scratch upon my window. I finish my homework and dry my hair, and then I sit on my bed, looking around.

"Just like a Forks sunset,"Charlie said the day we painted my bedroom, and he was right. I flick the switch and the twinkle lights glow above my bed, a scattering of muted stars against the mellow orange wall. I've spent the loneliest hours of my life in this room, this place caught perpetually between the stars and sunset - forever twilight - but it's not a lonely place to me anymore.

I throw the window open and take a long look outside, breathing deeply of the humid air. Through the trees, the world outside darkens, green to gray to black. Twilight passes quietly by and, with the lengthening of every shadow, nightfall inches nearer. All I have to do now is wait for it to come.

I crouch near the foot of my bed, testing the floor. The loose floorboard creaks under my hand, and I pull it up, revealing the store of treasures underneath. I begin with the first, as I do every night, unrolling the thick white paper and smoothing it carefully on the floor. This drawing of a prettier version of me, the delicate pencil lines and light shading generous in their placement, was on the seat of my truck in the school parking lot, the day after he first came to my window. On the page, I'm leaning on my windowsill, gazing through the leaves with eyes lit by awe and wonder, the ghost of a smile playing at my lips.

Every day now, there's something waiting for me on the seat of my truck after school. I take the other things out one by one and lay them on the floor next to the drawing, listening all the while for a footfall on the stairs. It's an odd collection; a small brown river stone, a soft white feather, an Indian head penny, a papery dried flower that must be many years old and a piece of rosy pink glass that must have lain underwater somewhere for a very long time to be so smooth. They look pretty against the hardwood floor next to the face that isn't quite mine, this collection of found things and old things that are precious as gold to me.

Soft murmurs and slow footsteps come up the stairs, and I quickly put my treasures back and replace the floorboard. Charlie and Renee say a quick goodnight and my heart races. It won't be long now, any second, and I wait on the bed, legs bouncing, breathing deeply. The howl of the wolf comes first, close by, and then, finally, there it is.

The scratch-scratch scratch-scratch on my window.

I move slowly, pulling the curtain back, expecting the silent inching open of the window to begin, but it's apparent immediately that he's in no mood to take things slowly tonight. The window is swiftly opened and there he is, right in front of me, his golden eyes intense and commanding.

"Go to the bed," he says, and I take a step back. _No, oh God no, not like that._ The color drains from my face but he shakes his head minutely.

"No," he says, "not… that. Just sit. I just need you to be still. You mustn't move, Bella."

I nod, backing away slowly from the window until the backs of my knees hit the bed and I sit, my hands gripping the mattress on either side of my legs. He waits a moment and then climbs through the window, graceful as a cat until he is standing just inside, and he moves no closer.

There have been moments beyond counting already in my young life, each one barely distinguishable from the next, and then there is this moment, this single drop in an ocean of time. I have never known a moment to be so still and so full.

The look on his face is unbearable to me and I grip the mattress tighter. The pain it causes him to be this close to me, to be in this room, is clear in every line and shadow on his face. The guilty paradox is that it's his pain that soothes me. He's fighting, I know, to resist and it's this fight in him, this determination to deny his nature, which allows me to breathe a little easier.

There are a thousand things I want to know, a thousand questions I want to ask, but there is one more important to me than all others, and it must be asked first. I take a deep breath for courage, and begin.

"Are you OK?" I ask. My whisper in the silence startles him and it's all there in his eyes, pain and danger and warning. I know I should be more afraid than I am but his beauty, too, reassures me. He stands against the wall, his lean frame tall and strong, and that face, seraphic in the dim light; it's hard to believe that something so beautiful could hurt me.

"Not really," he says. "You?"

I shrug. "You tell me."

"You're OK," he says, "for now."

Silence falls again, the ticking clock and the rustle of leaves against the breeze marking out the minutes until, finally, he speaks again.

"Tell me one thing," he says. "Don't think about it. Just answer. What are you thinking right this second?"

I blurt it out, just as he wants me to. "I'm wondering if this is what Angela was talking about, and I'm thinking that maybe it is."

He scowls. "You know I have no idea what that means, don't you?"

"I'm counting on it," I reply. He leans against the wall, relaxing his stance a little.

"You can't imagine how strange this is for me," he says.

"For me, too," I murmur, and he stares a little harder. "Am I safe?"

"No," he says. "Most definitely not. I warned you, Bella. "

"I know, I just – I don't know what you want from me."

His eyes darken, a heaving sigh, and he swallows heavily. "Probably not what you're thinking."

"You don't want my… blood?"

I knew it would happen as soon as I said the word. The last trace of golden light evaporates from his eyes as he answers. "Oh, I want it, Bella, you can't imagine how much." He raises his chin and holds my gaze, steady and unblinking. "But I won't have it."

It's impossible to feel relieved when he's looking at me like that, the craving burning in those eyes, but at least he _sounds_ convincing. "What is it you want from _me_?" he asks. "Why do you allow me in?"

"I want to know," I say.

"What?" he says. "What is it that you want to know?"

"Everything," I whisper. "I want to know everything about you, all of your secrets, and I want you to know mine."

"Intimacy," he breathes. "You want intimacy. Such a dangerous thing to want from me."

But I don't care. In this moment, while he's in this room with me, even though his eyes are black and gleaming bright with danger, it feels worth the risk.

~~~ O ~~~

In the nights that follow, it seems to become easier for him but still I'm haunted by the image of Angela and Ben, carefree on the beach. The air in my bedroom seems to crackle and spark, alive with promise and clandestine whispers, overshadowed always by the thrill and the threat of dark desires straining to be unleashed. Everything seems just out of reach or barely held at bay. It's a heady mix, this thing that draws us one to the other, but there is yet to be any joy in it. I wonder if I'll ever see him smile.

My promise of patience is pushed to breaking point many times in the nights that follow, but I hold fast. He has questions, so many questions, and I answer them all. In a strange, unexpected way, I get to know myself better at the same time as he gets to know me. I want there to be nothing but truth between us, and even the simplest question – what's your favorite color, Bella? - is given a considered and thoughtful answer.

His curiosity is insatiable, but on his fourth night in my bedroom I finally break, pleading for respite and satisfaction. "It's my turn," I say. "Please?"

He folds his arms, leaning back against the wall. I can never tell from one night to the next how close he'll come. Sometimes he makes it almost to the bed and then, for no reason I can discern, he'll back away slowly until he reaches the wall again, inching closer once more when he's feeling stronger. It's a dangerous game to play, this high stakes game of cat and mouse, but every night here we are, ready and willing to ante up and play again.

"I won't answer everything, Bella. I promised I wouldn't lie to you, and I won't, but there are things that are not mine to tell."

He's taught me this much already without ever saying a word, and I'm grateful for it. I would no sooner expect him to tell me the secret my father harbors, if he even knows, than I'd expect him to tell Charlie of this strange, secret world I inhabit now. I understand them a little better now, my mother and father, and bridges I thought to be burned forever are slowly being rebuilt. Every day I conceal him from them, and very day I understand and forgive their lies to me a little more.

I lead off with the question that's plagued me from the moment I first realised what he is. Images of pharaohs and Tudor houses and ancient, creaking sailing ships flood my mind, and I dread the answer.

"How old are you?"

"I was changed in 1917," he says, without hesitation, obviously expecting this question, and I exhale, failing to stop the smile from breaking through. He is incredulous.

"You're _smiling_?" I nod, beaming. This is nothing like what I feared. He's from a past I can understand. I know what it looks like, how people dressed and spoke, how they lived. It's possible there is even a person - a human – who is alive today who is the same age as him. I fire questions at him, liberated and giddy.

"The sun?"

No answer.

"Mirrors, garlic, crosses?"

"Myths."

"You're immortal?"

"We can be killed. It's not easily done but we can die, just not of illness or old age." I can't process this, can't even begin to comprehend the forever he speaks of, and I'm thrown for a long moment. Angela's words come to me again, and I see the universe spread over a space I can't imagine, occupying time beyond measure, and Edward there in it, always and forever. He interrupts these impossible thoughts, perhaps knowing that it's too much for me, with a question of his own.

"How did you know about me?" He has moved closer as we've talked. He's halfway across the room now, almost close enough for me to reach out and touch.

"A book," I reply. "You gave me plenty of clues, but it was a book on the Quileute that clinched it. Do you want to see it?" He waves a hand, no. "The Quileute," I say, "are wolves." Stony silence from Edward, but I know I'm right about this. "I think if the book is right about you, and it is, it must be right about them, too. Besides, I've heard them."

"You've heard them?"

"Every night, right before you come to my window." It wasn't until the third night that I realised it, but they're as much a part of this strange, new nightly routine as that scratching on my window is. Renee and Charlie say goodnight, a wolf howls, and Edward appears; every night is the same. "The book says you're mortal enemies. Is that true?" He shrugs. "I think that sound is a warning. I think they're out there watching and waiting in case you hurt me."

"You know more than I thought you did," he says, "but there's still one thing you don't know."

My stomach rolls, and I stare at the floor, tears pricking my eyes. I don't want to ask. I don't want to know. It was hard to ask him how old he is, hard to hear that he'll live for all eternity. Forever scares me out of my head, but this question, this is the one that will change everything.

"Come on, Bella," he urges. "Ask me?"

I raise my head and wipe a tear away, and look him in the eye.

"What do you eat?"

"Animals," he says. "We live on the blood of animals."

And finally, there it is; a smile that begins at one corner of his mouth and spreads across his face. It lights up the room, a beautiful thing, and I watch closely. His teeth are white and even, and there are no fangs no fangs _no fangs_ and suddenly anything, everything seems possible. I smile too, overjoyed and relieved beyond reason, sitting on my hands to stop myself from reaching out to touch him.

There's one more question I have to ask.

"Why me?"

The smile vanishes in a heartbeat and his eyes begin to darken. I don't think he'll answer, but instead of moving away, he moves closer. He crosses the distance between us, his lean frame loose and easy, at odds with the dark expression on his face. He stops just inches away, and I breathe deeply as he leans in to whisper in my ear, closer than he has been since that day in Port Angeles.

"You're a very unlucky girl, Bella. The gods have finally taken pity on me. They've designed you exactly for me," he whispers, his cool breath like a winter chill on my skin. "Everything about you invites me in. I am bewitched and bewildered." He pulls away slightly, far enough that I can see his eyes, gleaming black, hypnotic and wild. "I know how this ends for you, Bella, and still I cannot stay away."

~ O ~

Thanks so much for reading. This story is really as much Alby, Liz and Annette's as it's mine, so if you liked this chapter and you're of a mind to review, maybe blow them some kisses?


	11. Chapter 11

Thanks always to Lizf22 for endless friendship, patience and plotting in chat, and Annetteinoz and Alby Mangroves for the lovely WC's and mad beta skills.

Disclaimer: Stephenie Meyer owns it all. I think she's a peach to let us use it.

~~~ Charlie ~~~

My footsteps echo through the empty house, just as they always used to do. The sound is reassuring and I glance over my shoulder, checking that my shadow is there, too. I was never very good at being alone and now I've lost the knack of it altogether. This weightless drifting is all I seem capable of while I wait, as untethered as the dust motes that float in the mid afternoon sunshine, for my wife and daughter to come home. I wander to the kitchen, to the faded picture on the fridge. I recall the look of wonder on Bella's face the day she came back home to Forks and saw that picture there. It would have been a thing half remembered to her, if at all, but there was a look of silent acknowledgement that passed between us that day which could never happen now.

Our daughter has come back to us a little, the wound her mother and I carved deep in her heart beginning, somehow, to heal. I don't know if it's time, or surrender, or loneliness, or a combination of all those things, but there is less judgement and more understanding in her eyes. It's me now who can't reach out to her. With every visit to the meadow, each one to meet another of the Cullens, the pit has become deeper, the noose tighter, the tightrope higher, until all I can see are all the ways this could go wrong. It's impossible for me to imagine a way things could possibly go right, and I can't seem to find a way out from inside my head.

I don't know how to protect her anymore and, even though Bella is no safer in this house than she is anywhere else, still I wish she was home now, where I could see her.

I wander around the yard, kicking the dirt and squinting into the sun. Small, green spears poke through the dark, sodden earth, and the air feels warmer, smells fresher. The weather is slowly turning and spring will soon be here. A lazy breeze sends a string line fluttering on a crooked picket- not one of the wooden stakes laid out for Renee's studio standing straight anymore. Buffeted mercilessly by the wind and the rain through the long, dark winter, it will all need to be laid out again. That is, if Sam ever returns.

Renee's abandoned studio has become a kind of sign to me, a marker in this desolate sea, that the safety of dry land still lies far from reach. Sam and the pack spend all their time running patrols or watching Bella and me, watching us more closely than ever before. Sam has no time for work. The tribe has banded together, with those who can work putting food on the tables of those who can't. It's the way it's always been with the Quileute.

I stoop to gather a line of string from the ground, winding it around my fist as I follow it around the yard. I wonder that Bella doesn't feel the eyes of the Quileute on her, but then she never has. They have always been there. All through her childhood years in Phoenix, they guarded her and protected her. Even though there was never a need for action, still, they watched.

And now they are everywhere, still watching, swarming like ants on honey.

They're watching me now.

And while they watch, a bold army marching through the forest or camouflaged in human skin in the town, I spend all my time wondering. I try to piece together fragments of information and nuances of word and expression that will not, no matter how hard I think, come together as a whole. Billy's cryptic warning circles like a bird over carrion, threatening to swoop and gather Bella and I in its merciless claws and carry us away forever. Harry is hiding something, and I cannot even begin to guess what it is.

It has been made clear to me, in a slow and relentless death by a thousand cuts, that the Cullens mean to stay in Forks for a long time. I've met all of them now, all but one. They've each tested themselves against the lure of my blood, with only the seventh staying away, unable to trust himself. At the last meeting in the meadow Carlisle Cullen told us, with a depth of sadness I wouldn't have thought possible, that this seventh unseen vampire is leaving, and is taking another with him.

But still the rest will remain.

I should feel relieved that their numbers have been reduced to five, but I don't fool myself for an instant.

It only takes one.

~~~ O ~~~

Renee's car pulls into the drive, back from her afternoon in Port Angeles. I tip the dregs of my coffee onto the ground and walk around the side of the house with a quick stride, searching through the reflections on her windshield for a glimpse of her face. The sight of her takes my breath away, but not in the way it usually does. She sits frozen behind the wheel, the car still idling, staring straight ahead. My step quickens again as I take in her pale face, her glazed eyes, her white-knuckled grip on the steering wheel. I rush to the door, open it, and grab her arm.

"Renee?" I shake her arm gently. "Renee, are you OK?"

She turns to me slowly, wide eyed and whispering. "She looked like a _person_, Charlie. I didn't know they could look like _people_."

I take her hand and pull her gently from the car, gripping her shoulders. "My God, Renee, you saw one, didn't you?" I pull her to me and hold her tight, breathing the words. "You saw one in Port Angeles."

When we get inside, I head straight for the fridge. Sugar is good for shock, every cop knows that, and I pour a glass of Coke for each of us. Renee's hand trembles, the drink spilling over the lip of her glass into a small, black puddle on the table.

"I was alright until I got in the car," she says in a dreamlike monotone, "and then I couldn't stop shaking."

I need to get her talking. "Tell me, Renee. Tell me what happened."

"I just walked into a store, and there she was." She licks the drink absently from her fingers, staring over my shoulder to the window.

"She was shopping?"

"No," Renee says, shaking her head. "It's her store. She's opened her own store in Port Angeles. Homewares and gifts. I went in to buy a present. I was wandering around looking at things for ten minutes before I realized." She shudders. "She just came up to me, just like anyone would, and asked if I wanted any help." She shakes her head slowly in wonder. I feel the bile rise at the image of my wife, so vulnerable, completely unaware of whose company she was in.

"Her eyes, Charlie, one look at those eyes and I knew." She takes a sip of her drink. "I told her who I was. I couldn't just pretend I didn't know." She's beginning to come out of it a little, her shoulders are lower and her voice more animated. "'I'm Renee Swan'. She just stared for a moment, and then… then she held her hand out for me to shake. 'I'm Esme Cullen', she said."

"You didn't... touch her, did you?" My stomach clenches as I picture Renee licking the drink from her fingers moments ago.

"No," Renee says. "I just kind of left her hanging, her hand limp in the air. She just nodded, and looked really sad. 'You must hate me,' she said."

"And then?"

"And then we talked."

"You talked? About what?"

"I told her I was very unhappy about her family being here, that we're terrified for our daughter, and that I'm terrified for you. I asked her how she lives with herself, putting us through this."

"Oh my God," I breathe.

"I was calm, Charlie. We both were. Polite. Civilized. The last thing I wanted was to provoke her. I just think that maybe they're not aware."

"Aware of what? They know we're not happy about them being here, Renee. I've made that plain enough."

"I know that. I do. It's just… I don't know." She sighs. "From what you've told me, the Quileute get out in that meadow and do whatever it is they do. They talk about lines of demarcation and documents signed and witnessed and all that nonsense. And I know you, Charlie, you're the most inscrutable man I know. So steady, so stoic." Her thumb rubs my hand, a circular emphasis that makes me wish I could see myself as she sees me. "All the things that go on inside your head and in your heart, things no one sees but me. I wanted her to understand, really understand, how things are for us."

My wife is smarter than me, and braver than me. There have been times over the years when maybe I've forgotten that, but I never will again after today.

"She said that it's hard for them to stay here knowing how we feel, that from their point of view they know we're safe, but that there's nothing they can do to convince us of that. It will take time, but we just have to learn to trust them."

She twists her hair around her fingers as she speaks. She's drifting again, her voice taking on that detached quality once more. I pass the glass to her. "Drink, Renee," I say and, like an obedient child, she does.

"She said that she understands our concerns, but that she has her own family to consider. They need to be here-she wouldn't say why-but this is where they must be right now."

She lets my hand go, and takes her empty glass to the sink. She fills it with water, and sips, her shoulders hunched as she gazes out the window. "She didn't look quite how I'd imagined, not really how you described them. She was gentle – her voice, her manner. She was kind of beautiful, Charlie." I can't disguise my shock, and Renee hears my gasp from across the room. She turns to face me. "Honestly, if it wasn't for the eyes, I wouldn't have known." She sighs.

Her voice sounds far away when she speaks again, as though this, of all things, is the most difficult for her to believe. "She had some of my fabrics for sale in her store," she says. "I couldn't believe it. She told me she ordered them online months ago."

She turns, leaning against the sink, her face tight and drawn.

"Charlie," she says, hesitantly, "that's not all."

She sits next to me again, taking my hand in hers. Her fingers are icy cold, and she swallows heavily.

"She…," Renee's eyes drop to our hands, our fingers intertwined in a collapsed church-steeple of white knuckles. "She said her husband is starting work at the Forks Hospital in a week, and she hopes we won't be upset about it."

I reel, blindsided. Images of injured children and pregnant women and sick babies and blood, and blood, and more blood flicker through my mind, faster and faster, until I can't take it anymore. I knock the chair on its back as I rise, splashing cold water from the faucet on my face. I think I might vomit, and I wait, hunched over the sink, gulping cold air until the nausea passes.

Renee's concerned face is pale, too pale, as her eyes dart repeatedly from mine to the trees outside our window.

At least I know now what Harry has been hiding from us.

I pick up the phone and dial, punching the numbers viciously.

"Billy," I say, when he picks up, "get over here now, please."

~~~ O ~~~

Renee goes over and over her encounter with Esme Cullen while we wait for Billy. The repetition seems to dull the shock, and by the time his truck pulls up in the drive, we're both calmer.

Billy eyes me warily across the kitchen. A silent conversation takes place over Renee's stooped shoulders. He looks for the anger he expects to see in me and is puzzled that it's not there. I raise my chin, sliding my eyes to my wife. He understands. We take care of Renee first. There'll be time later for everything else.

Renee raises her head and offers Billy a watery smile. He already knows what happened, of course. Sam would have phoned him while Renee was still in the store. "So," he says, his dark eyes serious, "I see you met your first vampire."

"I sure did," she replies.

"How'd that go?" She shrugs, shakes her head, a rueful smile. I know she'll feel better the more she talks it out, but that's not why I asked Billy here. There's no time for talk just now. Bella will be home from work soon. We need to hurry.

"Billy," I say, "I want you to do something." His eyes dart to mine, a questioning glance. "I want you to phase for Renee."

Billy isn't easily shocked, but his mouth hangs open for a long time before he stutters out a shaky word. "Wh-what?"

"She's had a hell of a shock today, Billy, and I imagine she's probably feeling pretty vulnerable right now. Would that be right, Renee?" She nods, almost as surprised as Billy is. I keep my tone slow and quiet, conversational. "So, how about you show her how quickly Sam could've gotten inside that store today if he'd needed to. How about we let Renee see exactly what it is that's protecting our daughter, protecting all those people in Forks and Port Angeles. I'm sure it'd help her sleep tonight, Billy."

We walk a short distance into the forest beyond our yard. It's hard for me to be in here, harder still to bring Renee with me. The trees loom, their branches reaching ever upwards for the rare sun, and I flinch as the ferns bat at my ankles as we pass by. The woods seem to close in around me, and I resist the urge to look over my shoulder, to peer into the branches above. Billy is here and the wolves are everywhere. We're safe.

I stop Billy after a few minutes, and he raises an eyebrow at Renee. "You sure about this?"

She nods. "I think so," she says. "Yes. Yes, I am. Do it, Billy. Charlie's right. I need to know my family is safe."

Billy smiles briefly at Renee, his dark eyes dancing, and then he explodes. Strips of clothing fly through the air, and a massive beast stands on the carpet of leaves where Billy was just moments before. Renee stares, open-mouthed, and leans against me heavily. "Good God," is all she says.

Billy knows what he needs to do. He runs away and around, nothing but a blur between the trees. He knocks an enormous tree to the ground with a single swipe, catching it before it thunders to the ground. Boulders are rolled with a twitch of his tail and his jaws rip a tree trunk to shreds. It's a reassuring show of strength and speed, and through it all, Renee just stares.

When he's done, he pads up to us and cocks his head at Renee. His eyes are Billy's eyes, dark and dancing, and she gives him a weak smile. Her hand reaches out, trembling and tentative, and she touches his face briefly.

She turns to me, and ducks her head. "Charlie," she says, "I think I need a drink."

Billy catches my eye when we reach the forest's edge. He looks over his shoulder, and back at me. He wants to go, to give Renee a chance to take it all in .

"Tell Harry I'll be over later," I say pointedly, and he nods. He knows.

I pour some brandy for Renee and light the fire, and she sits quietly for a long time, staring into the flames. She's seen it all now, everything in one day, and when she looks up at me, her face is deathly pale in the flickering firelight.

"It's the strangest thing," she whispers into my shoulder, "but I don't know that I truly believed any of this was real until today."

~~~ O ~~~

I pull up on the dirt road in front of Harry's yard. I haven't been here since that night Harry first told us the Cullens were here, since he told me about the Quileute needing these vampires to stay in Forks to trigger the phase, and I haven't seen him at all since the first visit to the meadow. He has been sick with pneumonia, too sick to leave the house or to even speak to me. Billy refused outright to take Harry's place, in human form, beside me in the meadow, unable to protect me that way, and so another elder has stood beside me for our meetings with the Cullens.

The house smells like a nursing home, the thick scent of vegetable soup trapped in the narrow hallway as Sue lets me in. "Don't be long," she whispers. "He gets tired quickly."

Harry sits in the same chair, in the same room, but everything else is different. He used to occupy that chair like a king on his throne, imperious and commanding, issuing orders with firm authority. Now he sits with a dinner tray on his lap, slowly sipping thin soup, his bony shoulders hunched over the bowl.

"Harry?"

"Charlie, come sit," he says, motioning with a feeble hand to the sofa. "I'm done here, Sue." He wipes his mouth with a napkin, and Sue takes the tray away, disappearing into the kitchen. Billy raps on the front door and comes straight in, leaning against the wall with his arms folded, staring at the floor. Neither of them will meet my eyes.

"You feeling better?" I ask.

"I'm alright," Harry replies. He brushes something from the front of his shirt and then, finally, raises his chin and looks me full in the face. "How're you doing, Charlie?"

"Not so good." I clear my throat, wishing for some water, and run my hands along my thighs. I do not want to have this conversation. "I guess I just don't know when it happened," I say. "When I became someone you keep things from. When I became someone you don't trust."

"Maybe you'd better start by telling me what it is I've kept from you," he says.

"You must know what I'm talking about. One of those Cullens has opened a store in Port Angeles, and Carlisle Cullen is going to start work at the Forks Hospital." My eyes narrow. "Why, what else is there?"

"I wasn't sure you knew about the hospital," he says, with a weary shrug.

"Well, I do," I say. "Why didn't you tell me, Harry? What possible reason could you have not to warn me? My daughter could have walked into that store."

"Look, Charlie, you need to relax. They're not going to do anything stupid."

"You can't know that. You cannot possibly know that." I pause, taking a moment to moderate my voice. This dimly lit room, the cooking smells undercut with the familiar scent of antiseptic and decay, and the bag of bones that Harry has become, all combine to demand certain things. I'm determined that there will be quiet voices and reasonable, measured behaviour, no matter what it costs me. "I think you're being very cavalier about all this, Harry. He's going to work in the _hospital_."

"You seem to think that I had a say in all this," he says, with an impatient wave of his hand. "The truth is Charlie, they'll do what they want to do. I know you think the treaty isn't worth a damn, but it is. They know we'll tear them apart if they put a foot wrong, but you have to understand that they're not going to ask me for permission every time they make a move."

"Alright," I say, "I get that, Harry, but it still doesn't explain why you kept it from me."

He's weak and thin and barely half the man he was, but I should have learned long ago never to underestimate him. With an effort of will I can only guess at, he stands, swaying a little, and unleashes a tirade I wouldn't have believed he had the stamina for.

"I didn't tell you, Charlie, because I _don't_ trust you." He stands over me, his eyes lit with a fire I thought lost to him, as I recoil under his words. "We need them here, you know that. If they leave we'll lose the trigger for the young ones to phase and I didn't want to risk you making trouble before they got settled in here. I think you forget sometimes that there's more at stake than just your daughter's life."

I sit like a statue on the couch, telling myself that I have to take it, that he's lashing out at fate and life and death and borrowed time, not at me, because I can't - I_ cannot _- believe he means what he says.

"There's a bigger picture here, Charlie. You'd do well to remember that."

And as quickly as it came, the fire dies in his eyes, replaced by something colder and more calculated. He sits weakly, spent, his whispered words chilling the blood in my veins. "I don't trust you, Charlie, not anymore. I think you would have run, wouldn't you, given half a chance. You put your daughter's life before your people and mine, you always have, and I can't have that."

I glance at Billy but he will not look at me, his head bowed to the floor, his face hidden by the veil of his hair. Harry's eyes are as cold as ice as he relaxes back into his chair, the lids growing heavy as he watches me. I can't look away, caught powerless, until finally his eyes close, his chin bouncing softly on his chest. A soft snore escapes as I watch him.

Billy walks me out, the stiff set of his shoulders telegraphing his emotions, but when he turns to me his face is an impassive mask, his eyes clouded and dull.

I lean against the porch post, drained and defeated. "Jesus Christ, Billy, there's something else, isn't there?" I say. "Is it the red one? Has she come back?"

"No," he says, "it's not that."

"But there's something, isn't there?" I know it's useless to ask, I know he can't answer me but still I plead with him, wishing his will was enough to break the bonds that command his silence. "Godammit, Billy, tell me."

I feel the same sense of loss that I did that night at Harry's. The same wave of sadness washes over me, the desecration of something noble being sullied and cheapened. The Quileute Chief has used his power for centuries, and always for the same purpose: to communicate and to lead. Harry has taken this gift and twisted it into something ugly. He's using it to control his people, to bend them to his will, to force them to do things they would not choose to do.

And I know, with a single glance at Billy's dead eyes, that there is more, still more, that is being kept from me.

I never would have believed it would come to this, but in this moment my most fervent wish is that Harry Clearwater's death cannot come soon enough, and the shame of that thought is almost more than I can bear.

Billy looks at me with pity in his eyes and then he shakes his head, turns his back on me and walks away.

~~~ O ~~~

I wake shivering on cold sheets. Renee is gone and I check in Bella's room first, knowing Renee will be finding it impossible to sleep. She's not there, though, and I watch Bella for a moment. She must be dreaming, her breathing too rapid for one sleeping peacefully. I close her drapes, kiss her cool forehead and head down the stairs.

Renee sits at the kitchen table under a pool of yellow light, her hands too busy for this quiet time of night. Papers and charcoal are strewn everywhere, a cloth rag stained black at her elbow and her head bowed low over her work. I clear my throat as I approach and she glances up, smiling. Her eyes are bright but still rimmed with red and her lips are dry and cracked. I peer over her shoulder at the drawings on the table, not surprised to see that it's Esme Cullen's face I see repeated on every sheet of paper.

"Is this really what she looked like to you?"

She nods and I pick a drawing up, trying to find a trace of the creature I met in the meadow in this beautiful face on the page. The features are the same, but this face looks undeniably human. My blood runs cold at the sight of it. All along I've clung to the conviction that they could never pass for human, that even if they are to be here, they would have to be hidden from view high in the mountains. That hope is gone now and I wonder, not for the first time, how much worse things can get.

Renee runs her hands under water at the sink, washing the black smudges from her skin and pours coffee for us both. Her fingernails click a rapid beat on the cup as she sits beside me.

"How long is it since you've been for a run?"

"I don't know," I reply, rubbing my thumb across my chin, "a week or so, I guess."

"It's been two and a half weeks."

"Oh," I reply. It's all I can think of to say, unsure why this, of all things, is on her mind.

"You run for Bella," she says. "The way you eat, the way you look after yourself, it's all for her. Stay healthy, live a long life so she can be protected from the truth, from the meadow, for as long as possible, right?"

"Right."

"Well, why have you stopped?"

"I don't know," I reply, staring into my coffee, as if the answer can be found in the grounds that rest on the bottom. It seems like as good a place as any to look right now.

"I know why," she says. "You've become way too fatalistic about all this, Charlie. I think part of you has given up on her, and given up on yourself, and I really believe that you're wrong to be thinking like that."

She stands behind my chair, wrapping her arms around my chest, her fingers drumming on my chest.

"Did you see what Billy did? My God, Charlie, what are we afraid of? The Quileute are everywhere, and the Cullens, Charlie, they feed on animals. _Animals._"

She picks up a piece of paper and a black Sharpie and draws for a few moments on a fresh sheet, crisp lines and quick strokes. A caricature of a face that's instantly recognisable appears beneath the fine point; the moustache and heavy brows, the small eyes and square chin. She finishes off with the number thirty-eight at the top in large, thick lettering with an exuberant exclamation point at the end.

She takes the paper to the window, leaning over the sink and craning her head up. "Come here," she says, "and look at this."

It's the wrong time of year for a harvest moon, but still tonight's moon is full and bright, casting a glossy sheen over the forest. Scudding clouds move across the sky, illuminated in shades of grey and silver and deep purple as they pass across its brilliant light. Renee clutches my hand.

"I hated the sky in Phoenix," she says. "Flat and endless blue, day after day." She turns to me, fingers stroking my face, my hair, searching and desperate. "We lost thousands of days; birthdays and Christmas and every single insignificant day in between."

"I'm tired of creeping around this town jumping at shadows. I'm tired of feeling powerless and I'm tired of being afraid. You tell me Harry's hiding something from us and there's not a thing we can do to find out what it is? Well then," she says with a shrug, "there's nothing we can do."

She raises her chin, her dark eyes dancing in the darkness. "It's time we took our lives back. It's your birthday next week, Charlie, and we are going to celebrate." She holds up the drawing, waving it back and forth. "We're throwing a party."

Her face is pale in the moonlight, her brittle smile and bright eyes seem more in need of comfort than encouragement. I think of the phone calls Bella made sometimes from Phoenix, when the nature of the energy her mother poured into her painting would leave Bella feeling anxious and unsettled. I understand now what she meant, but still I can't bring myself to be that man to my wife, the one who takes things away instead of giving them.

So I pour everything I have into my smile, and tell her how great that will be, how much I'd love a party.

~ O ~

Thanks so much for reading x

Happy Birthday Twin xx


	12. Chapter 12

Thanks again to Liz, Annette & Alby for giving up their time for this. Thanks also to the lovely WC ladies.

Disclaimer: It all belongs to Stephenie Meyer.

Two chapters in a week – no one is more surprised than me….!

~ Bella ~

It will be a long day, I know that before it even begins. Yesterday was hard enough, the slow minutes grinding into long hours that didn't seem to move the clock along at all. Finally, though, school was done, work was done and night fell. I took up my place at the window, desperate for Edward to appear, to explain.

_I know how this ends for you, Bella._

Edward left as soon as those words were uttered, his hurried command to get into bed, that my mother was coming, was all there was time for before he disappeared through the window.

So I waited last night, peering through the leaves at the moonlit night beyond, but Edward never came. The only visitors to my room were my mother and father. Their restless wanderings had me running from the window to my bed and back again in a strange game of cat and mouse that only I knew we were playing. I stayed awake for as long as I could, hoping as the night wore on that he might appear, but as Renee came and went, came and went, and then Charlie too, I knew he wouldn't come.

So here I am, the darkness slowly lifting as the dawn breaks through, with another day's worth of hours to fill before I can hope to speak to him again.

I pull the quilt up over my head and hide in the purple cave underneath as the sun begins its slow journey from one horizon to the other. Maybe if I faked illness I could stay here all day. Maybe my mother would go out and leave me alone for a time.

Maybe Edward would come.

It's dark under here, which I don't mind, but already time is standing still, and the air is hard to breathe. I don't think he'd come anyway, not in broad daylight. It's an effort to get out of bed, get dressed and make it down the stairs, but I do it. Anything to pass the time.

My mother seems to be in a rush to get everything done this morning, her bathrobe billowing behind her as she rushes from skillet to table, and back again. There are papers spread everywhere amongst the clutter of Sharpies and scissors on the table. She gathers them up and dumps them in the living room so we can eat.

I join Charlie at the table, stifling a yawn, and then a cunning thought strikes me. Instead of swallowing the yawn, I let it out, opening my mouth so wide that my jaw hurts.

"You didn't sleep well, Bella?"

"Not with you two in and out of my room all night." I rub my eyes, covering my face, telling myself that it's not really a lie. "I don't know how I'm going to stay awake in class today."

Charlie frowns, Renee looks worried, and my guilty intentions fill my stomach with lead. I know I won't be able to eat breakfast, but I also know they won't check on me tonight.

I pick up a single sheet of paper Renee left behind on the table. There's a drawing of a cartoonish version of Charlie on it, with a wide grin under his moustache and his crinkled eyes almost disappearing with his smile.

"What's this about?"

Charlie raises his eyes to the heavens, his moustache lifting in what is maybe meant to be a smile, but ends up more of a grimace. "Your mother's throwing me a birthday party."

"Where?" I ask. "When?"

Renee turns from the stove. "Next Saturday night, here."

I've never spent a birthday with my father. It's one of the things I was excited about when we moved here. It seems such a simple thing, just a regular birthday with family and friends, but all I can do now is wonder if I should even be looking that far ahead.

He said he knows how it will end for me, but I wonder, not for the first time since last night, if he knows _when_.

~~~ O ~~~

It's a strange thing to me that the world outside my bedroom looks the same as it always has, that the magic that happens within those four walls can be contained and confined. Every morning when I open the front door I expect the clouds to be raining colored confetti on my hair instead of raindrops, the wind to blow a rainbow of bright streamers through the sky, and the dirt beneath my feet to have turned from grains of sand to shimmering glitter. It has seemed to me that the whole world should sparkle and shine, but not today.

It's a drab day, the brief taste of spring in the air from yesterday vanishing with the moonlight. The sky is dull grey and low, with only a few bright white clouds, like chariots riding to heaven, moving slowly across the claustrophobic gloom. It feels right that the hours to come, the hours of waiting and wondering, will take place under such a sky as this, and today I'm not surprised when there's no carnival waiting for me on the streets of Forks. A drizzly rain begins as I unlock my truck, and I go back upstairs to get my coat.

I hope all day, just as I did yesterday, for some kind of message from Edward, a text telling me not to worry or perhaps a note in my truck, but my phone is silent. When the long school day finally ends and I find a sprig of white blossom waiting in my truck that could mean anything, I'm none the wiser.

My mother has been busy all day, because when I finally make it home, the scent of orange fragrant on my fingers from the small white flowers, the house has been turned upside down. There are things half-baked on the kitchen bench, pans piled high in the sink and lists of "Things To Do" pinned on the fridge. The curtains have been taken down in the living room, and her sewing machine is set up on the kitchen table, a long length of fabric half-stitched and hanging from the machine. She's leaning on the bench with pins in her mouth, writing addresses on envelopes when I walk in. When she sees me she spits the pins out, smiling brightly.

"Thank God you're home, Bella. There's so much to do." I throw myself into helping her, realizing as I do that our moods are mirror images, one of the other. Her manic energy and fractured concentration remind me so much of those times in Phoenix, and I know there's something wrong. I shrug it off though; she has Charlie now, and anyway, I'm so consumed with Edward that there is no space left to worry about my mother.

The afternoon wears on until finally, Charlie gets home from work. I cook dinner, waves of nervous energy pulsing through my body at random times as I peel and chop and fry. It's an effort to breathe through them, to calm myself enough to appear normal. Charlie is his usual preoccupied self though, and Renee can't sit still long enough to eat, grabbing mouthfuls of food as she swoops by the table on her way to begin yet another task. They don't really notice me.

I take a shower, but for the first time in my life I leave my books untouched in my school bag. Instead of doing my homework, I take the orange blossom and pick a few of the delicate white flowers from it, pinning them in my hair with trembling fingers and false bravado. I press the remaining sprig in between the pages of the book on the Quileute that is hidden under my mattress.

There's nothing else worth doing, so I sit at the window, waiting as darkness falls like a cloak around my shoulders, like the purple quilt over my head, making it hard to breathe.

~~~ O ~~~

He appears-as he always does-from nowhere but this time it's me who reaches out and opens the window. I have just enough self-control left not to grab at him, not to shake him and make him tell me now, _right now_, what happens to me.

"I'm so sorry, Bella. I couldn't risk coming last night," he says in a rush. "I've watched you checking your phone constantly, checking your truck at lunch. I just – I couldn't leave you a message or a note. It's something that should be said face to face."

This hurried outburst raises more questions than it answers, but they are things to be dealt with later. For now, I go to the bed, to my usual place and wait while he climbs through the window. He surprises me by coming straight to me, sitting close to me, almost touching me.

"Please, Edward," I whisper, watching his mouth, trying to guess from the shape of his lips which words will come out.

"You-," he says, and then he pauses, reaching his hand toward me. His fingers run through my hair, tracing the flowers there, and then he runs a single finger down my cheek, the first time he's touched me since Port Angeles. His cool touch sends a shiver, equal parts fear and longing, down my spine, but it's the look in his eye, urgent with some emotion I can't name, that holds me still.

The silence stretches on and on until I know in my heart what he will say.

"Bella," he whispers, "you become one of us."

"I…. what?" I gasp. "I don't die?"

"Not quite," he says, attempting a smile.

I try to smile back, and don't quite make it either. There are questions and questions and more questions still, but for a moment my racing mind can't settle on which to ask first.

He doesn't kill me.

_He doesn't kill me._

I don't die.

In fact, the opposite is true.

I will live forever.

~~~O~~~

"Bella," he says, "are you alright?"

I shake my head. "Not really."

"I seem to have trouble controlling myself around you. It's not the way I wanted to tell you. In fact, I'd hoped not to tell you at all." I've never seen him like this before. I've seen the human disguise drop like a veil over his other inhuman, unearthly face, but I have never seen him with this air of quiet vulnerability.

"What do you mean?" I ask.

"I thought that maybe, given time, it might be something you'd come to want."

"Oh." I feel tired suddenly, and consumed with confusion. The purple quilt is tucked neatly under me, and I would like nothing more than to climb under it again, just as I did this morning. I would want Edward to come with me this time though, so I could rest my head on his shoulder, my warm body against his cold one until we met in the temperate place that must exist somewhere between us. He would whisper softly in my ear, telling me everything while I slept, and when I woke in the morning he would still be there, and I would know what to do.

"Edward, please," I say, "I don't understand any of this. Please, tell me. Tell me everything."

"I don't know where to begin," he says. He looks sad, disappointed almost, and I think I know why, but I'm not willing to gamble anymore. It feels as though this wild ride is only just beginning and I find myself unwilling to go on blindly trusting him to steer for both of us.

"Begin at the beginning, Edward. Leave nothing out. How did you come to be?"

I half expect him to move away, to take up his place against the wall by my window, but no. He takes my hand in his, his firm, cool fingers wrapped around mine. "Is this alright?" he asks, and I nod.

And he begins, just like I asked him to, at the beginning with the story of his human life, his idyllic upbringing in Chicago at the turn of the last century. He was a privileged only child growing up in an era of peace and prosperity, until war cast its ugly shadow over the world. He longed to be a soldier, to join the fighting but before he had the chance, an epidemic as deadly as the guns in Europe took his parents, and would have taken him too, if not for Carlisle Cullen.

"He meant to save me from death," he says, "and himself from loneliness, but for years it seemed he'd condemned us both to a kind of living hell. In more than three centuries, Carlisle has never killed a human but I was not as strong as him, not then. I left him for a time and…"

He releases my hand, and walks to the window, gazing out into the darkness. The rain has stopped and the wind has died, but the moon is hidden deep behind the clouds tonight. The only light is from the lights above my bed, the only sound is his quiet voice, telling me things it seems impossible to believe.

"I did monstrous things, Bella. I was a one man vigilante army, dispensing harsh justice on anyone whose intentions weren't pure. I went back to Carlisle after a time, and watched as his family grew. First, Esme, his wife, then Rosalie and Emmett. Finally Jasper and Alice came to us, the only ones in our family not sired by Carlisle. I've watched them for decades, always on the outside looking in. Love and companionship and marriage for everyone, but not for me. For a long time I thought that there was something wrong with me, that something had happened when Carlisle changed me, that perhaps my soul was lost somewhere between death and rebirth," he says, the haunted sadness in his voice reflected in his face in the window. "I could never love anyone, not how they deserved to be loved. Not Carlisle, not my family, and certainly never real love, never romantic love." He turns. "And then Alice saw you."

"Alice is your…. sister?"

"My sister," he says. "She sees things." I shake my head, trying to clear it, trying to make space for the things he's telling me. "She sees the future, Bella, and she's seen yours."

It feels as though this bed is my only refuge from this stormy sea, that if I leave it, I might be swept away forever. I search the lights above my bed as though they are stars to navigate by, markers in the sky that might lead me home to safety, but there is no safe haven for me now. There is only Edward to cling to, and he is far from safe. He's set in motion a series of events that are hidden from me, but that he seems to believe can lead to only one outcome.

"We'd been living in Europe for years," he continues. "There are places there where the climate suits us but Emmett and Jasper prefer North America, so we decided to come back. Emmett found Forks and the moment we decided to come here, Alice saw you. She saw us together, Bella, lying in a meadow filled with wildflowers."

Edward stands by the window, with his glorious beauty and his iron will, replete with the maddening knowledge of exactly what my future looks like, and the power to summon it into being. I imagine his sister, a faceless, indistinct form in a room lit by flickering candles, a crystal ball before her, turning Tarot cards to decide which of my futures comes to pass.

He has told me the story of his life and, in the telling, has told me the story of my life too.

Grief overwhelms me, a life I'll never live flashing by in a series of picture postcards, a black and white montage of experiences I'll never have, and didn't even know I wanted until now.

The future his sister has seen is not one I've dared to acknowledge, even to myself. If I've thought of it at all, it has been only in those quiet moments after Edward leaves, lying in bed in that hazy insanity between being asleep and awake, where human thought is at its most fragile.

The dreams I've had in broad daylight are different. When I've dared to think of a future with Edward, I am me and he is a different version of himself.

I've hoped for a day when we could leave this room and be together outside the narrow confines of these four walls. I've wondered if he could wear his human disguise, if he could ever restrain the wild gleam in his eyes, and pass unnoticed in the world. I've imagined him in the cafeteria at school, walking me to class as the bell rings, or by a blue flamed fire at First Beach, laughing with my friends. I'd wear a blue dress and we'd slow dance at our prom and he'd kiss me and someday, one day, we'd make love.

He'd meet my mother and father.

I have been a fool.

I promised him I wouldn't push and I promised him I'd be patient, but the rules in this dangerous game have changed.

"Am I the only one?"

"What?"

"I don't know you, Edward. I don't know anything about you. Where do you go when you're not here? What happens to you in sunlight? When do I become like you? Do you sleep? Will _I _sleep?"

He watches me from his place by the window, retreating further from me just when I need him to be closer.

He is all knowing, and unknowable, and I'm afraid.

I want control, and I want to know if he's someone I should love.

"Have there been others before me?"

"I just told you I've never loved anyone."

"I don't mean love."

He shrugs.

"That's not an answer."

Nothing.

"Vampires or humans?"

"Bella," he says, "be careful."

But I don't want to be careful. I've spent the last two days thinking I was going to die, only to discover that my fate was decided long ago. This room feels haunted by ghosts I didn't even know existed until tonight, watching over me to make sure I fulfil a destiny I haven't yet chosen. I feel as wild and out of control as Edward looks.

"Vampires or humans?" I repeat.

He sighs. "It's only sex, Bella."

I wait.

"Vampires."

"And is that something that's possible for us?"

"No," he snaps, "it's not possible, not while you're human."

"Because?"

Before I can blink I'm propelled across the room, my back flat against the bedroom wall, with the full length of his body pressed against mine. His hands are planted against the wall, one on either side of my head, his legs on either side of mine, his eyes wild, blazing black.

"Because, Bella," he breathes, "I will not be able to help myself. I will sink my teeth into your throat and I will drink your blood and you will not survive. Does that answer your question?"

"No."

"No? _No?_"

"You remember that first day in Port Angeles, that tiny speck of blood on my hand. I'll bet the smell of it nearly drove you wild."

"Bella," he warns.

"I'll bet if I'd asked you that day, you wouldn't have believed you could ever be this close to me."

He takes a half step back.

"I think you underestimate yourself," I say, "and I know you underestimate me."

The air of vulnerability is gone, replaced instead with an aura of such intense sensuality that it surrounds him like a cloud. Whether he has any control over the flicking of this particular switch, if he's deliberately distracting me, or if his self control is nearing its limits, makes no difference to me. His sweet scent tastes like ambrosia on my tongue, and in this moment, all I want is more.

"Well now, Bella," he whispers, "I might be willing to try, but I'd need a little romance first."

~~~ O ~~~

A hot blush creeps up my throat and onto my cheeks, and I push him away, dizzy and dazed. He lets me pass and I go straight to the window, leaning on the sill to breathe in the cool night air. My head begins to clear, my thoughts slowly becoming more orderly. I knew I was in over my head, that I've had no control over this situation from the first moment I punched his number into my phone, but this is more than I ever bargained for.

The distance between us seems to calm Edward too, and he sits on my bed, frowning.

"Bella," he says, "that's not why I want you changed, if that's what you're thinking."

"I don't know what I was thinking," I mutter. "I don't know what to think."

His sister's vision of some pretty place in the forest, lovers reclined on a soft cloud of wildflowers and immortality, is nothing but a snapshot of a single moment in time. Where do we go, Edward and I, when we rise from the meadow, brushing the blooms from our hair?

"Tell me what you're thinking right at this moment," he says.

I don't hesitate. "Will I kill people?"

He smiles weakly, rubbing his neck. "From sex to murder. That's quite a jump for a human." This time I don't even try to return his smile.

"Will I?"

He sighs. "I don't know, Bella, but I do know that you'll want to."

I begin to shake, my body trembling like I've been buried neck deep in ice. I pull the window closed and draw the curtains, rub my arms up and down, but nothing helps. Edward takes a step toward me, but I shake my head.

"Please, don't." He stops dead, a raised eyebrow. "We don't seem to do so well when you get too close to me."

"No," he says, "that's true. We don't."

There are things tugging at the edges of my mind, something he said last night, something he said earlier, things that don't make sense. Right now, more than anything, I need something to make sense. Even the view from where I stand is wrong, the opposite of what it should be. Here I am, leaning against the wall by my window, while he sits on my bed, watching me.

_Watching me._

"You said something earlier," I say. "You said that you'd seen me at school checking my phone."

"Yes."

"How?"

Again, a maddening silence.

"It was raining all day today, Edward, and I was inside. The only time I went out was at lunch to look in my truck. I was inside all those times I checked my phone. How did you see me?"

He sighs, raking his fingers through his wild hair. "I saw you in the minds of your friends," he says. I stare at him, trying to make these words form some meaning I can recognize.

"You.…" I take a deep breath, and try again. "You…." I can't make the words come out, and he comes to my rescue, saying them for me.

"I can read minds, Bella." I slide down the wall until I hit the floor, and then I just sit there, as still as a statue, my mind blank.

His eyes dart to the door and back to me, and a second later he disappears, not out the window, but through the door. Before I can even wonder where he's gone, he's back with a glass of something cold in his hand.

"Drink," he says, crouching on the floor in front of me. I sip. "I can't read _your_ mind, Bella, if that makes things easier."

"What do you mean?"

"I can read every mind I've ever encountered, but not yours."

"Oh." I sip, frowning. "Why not?"

He shakes his head. "I have no idea."

"That's what you meant last night. You said that I was designed exactly for you."

"That's part of what I meant, yes."

"And the other part?"

"Partly I meant your disposition. I don't think there are many girls who would be as…. open to me as you've been. And partly I meant your blood."

"My blood?"

He nods. "Your blood. You're not like other people, Bella. Your blood is different, it's very… unusual. It's like a tantalising melody humming through the air, a siren song, luring me in. I can taste it in the air, smell it everywhere you've been." He swallows heavily. "It's very difficult for me to resist."

It sounds like torture for him, not at all like something to thank the gods for. Part of me wants to pity him, to feel sorry that he has to go through that to be near me, but the bigger part of me is lost, trying to get a firm foothold on the shifting sands of this strange night.

"You said I was unlucky."

"You are," he says. "Even after I got here and discovered the truth about you, still I couldn't stay away."

"The truth about me? What truth?"

Confusion clouds his face for a moment, and then his face clears. "Oh God, Bella, of course you don't know."

I think I might scream with frustration, the worn edges of my nerves frayed so fine they are ready to snap. "Edward, please?"

"Bella, when Alice saw you, you were one of us."

"I know that," I say, struggling to understand what he's trying to tell me. "You told me that."

"Don't you see? When I came to Forks, I thought you'd been changed already. Bella," he says, "I thought you were a vampire."

~~~ O ~~~

I feel lightheaded, giddy with relief. For the first time tonight, I feel on an even keel, as though maybe there's some hope, a way forward. Whatever has happened since, whatever mysterious force draws us to each other, he didn't come to Forks with a callous disregard for my human life. It's a slim thread, but I cling to it.

"There are other things at play here," he says, "things we don't understand. Alice's gift is subjective. The future changes depending on the decisions, the choices we make. Things can happen beyond our control that can change what she sees-at least that's the way it usually works-but there's something different about Forks."

"I don't understand."

"We don't really either, Bella. When we decided to come here and Alice saw you, my family were elated. Here was the one I'd been waiting for all these years, but I was more cautious. What if Alice was wrong? So we tested her vision, we decided not to come, and you disappeared."

"What do you mean, disappeared? I died without you?"

"We don't know, Bella. All we know is that we come here, and you become one of us. There's no other outcome. We don't come here and your future vanishes. At first we thought it was just you, but when we arrived here we discovered it's not just your future that disappears. There's something here that interferes with Alice's visions for all of us."

"Why did you stay, Edward? When you got here and discovered I wasn't a vampire already, why did you stay?"

"I very nearly didn't. It was…. difficult for me, Bella, to discover that you weren't who I thought you were. I nearly left, just walked away."

"Why didn't you?"

"I followed you to Port Angeles. I was intrigued. Here you were, this insignificant human girl, who somehow ends up with me? It made no sense. And then that van came straight for you. When I held you in my arms on that road, everything changed. Your blood, Bella, and I suspected your silent mind, but I wasn't sure. Maybe it was temporary - shock or a head injury. And then when I saw you in that store, I knew it was true." He smiles, hesitating, his dark eyes gleaming.

"You invited me in and I kept coming back for more, for the simple pleasure of asking a question I didn't already know the answer to."

My heart sinks at his words. I'm nothing more than a convenience to him, a companion at best, a toy at worst. I feel the suffocating pressure of a life eternal weighing down on me, and I want to run, to send him away, to be done with this madness forever.

"And then it happened," he says.

"What happened, Edward?" My voice sounds dead to me, flat and defeated, frightened and frightening. I dig my fingernails into my palms, determined not to cry.

"Bella, why do you think I come back here night after night? Why would I put myself through the torture of being in this room with you? Do you think I'd want you to be changed, to spend all eternity with you if I didn't love you?"

And there it is, finally. The world turns not on its axis, but on moments such as these, driven by a force stronger than physics, more powerful than gravity, a force that is at once more complicated and simpler than any other thing.

He pulls me to my feet with a touch so tender I have to close my eyes against it. I feel him moving closer still, his heady scent and cool breath at my throat, his lips a whisper against my skin, and then his voice in my ear, the words heavy and slow and deliberate, saying everything I ever wanted him to.

"Bella," he breathes, "I'm in love with you." His lips glide along my skin, his words echoing the ones I've said to him so often in my dreams. I say those words out loud now, and his hand returns to the orange blossom in my hair. He moves so slowly, as though through water, and I hold my breath as his lips brush mine. The low moan that hums against my mouth feels like a warning, and I move away a little, but he pulls me closer, whispering "Wait".

Balanced on a knife's edge, the tortured moments of craving and denial stretch on and on as Edward fights his lonely war. I try not to breathe, wondering if this is when it happens, and then conscious thought is gone as his cool lips, soft as a butterfly's wing, find mine once more. I inhale, breathing deeply, and this time the moan is mine, as long and slow as this kiss that is Edward's sweet victory, and mine.

Dawn paints the black sky red before Edward leaves. We've talked the whole night through.

He puts a finger to his lips as he leaves and touches it to my mouth, and to the wilted orange blossom in my hair.

I pull the flowers from my hair and put them under my pillow, to breathe their fading scent while I briefly sleep.

It feels just now, as I slide beneath the cool sheets and the purple quilt, as though Alice's moment in the meadow is a long way off. I'm not sure how I get there, or even if I want to go, but I know that if that's what truly comes to pass, Edward will be there with me until the end.

~ O ~

Thanks so much for reading.

If you happen to be looking for some vampy AU, I think these two stories are brilliant: The Count of Tuscany by Withany and A Garment of Brightness by miaokuancha :)


	13. Chapter 13

The lovely people – Liz, Annette and Alby Mangroves – have lives and jobs and kids and they still find time for my stuff. I think they're fabulous. Love also to the WC girls.

Disclaimer: Stephenie Meyer owns all the things.

~~~ Charlie ~~~

The day dawns clear as the miles add up behind me, my feet slapping an easy rhythm on the asphalt. I squint into the distance, as though I might be able to stare down any clouds lurking over the horizon, as though I might be able to warn them away to unload their cargo somewhere else today. No one but my wife would throw an outdoor party in Forks at this time of year.

"What if it rains, Renee?"

She has been adamant all week, never doubtful. "It won't."

She won't even look at a weather forecast. She has cooked and cleaned and prepared for days, pointing me first in this direction, and then in that direction, busy and determined. It's no coincidence that it's been the best week we've had since she got here, her restless hands and my restless mind occupied with something that isn't aligned in any way to anything other than _us_.

I guess this party has served its purpose before it even begins, and I wonder now, as I turn for home, if that was her intention all along.

A horn blasts behind me. Gil Stanley, on his way to work, waves a meaty hand out of his car window as he drives by.

Renee was right about something else too. I needed to start running again, not just for Bella's sake, but for mine as well. Forks people, like people everywhere I guess, love something to talk about. Small town folk don't much like change, and Renee coming back was a big one. I know they've been watching me, watching both of us probably, to see if she'll stick around this time. I have no idea what conclusions have been drawn from it, but it wouldn't have gone unnoticed that I haven't been seen running for a couple of weeks. Gil Stanley is the town's biggest gossip. Word will spread fast enough.

By the time I get home, Billy's truck is in the drive and Renee is up, knee deep in balloons in the living room. She's red-faced and panting, but smiling widely, as she calls up the stairs for Bella as soon as I walk in. I don't know what my wife has planned, but Billy has phoned a few times this week and asked to speak to Renee instead of me. She's shooed me out of the room every time, whispering with her hand cupped over the phone.

Bella appears at the foot of the stairs, dishevelled and sleepy, wishing me a happy birthday in her quiet way. Renee covers my eyes from behind, shuffling along at my back, as Bella leads me by the hand out of the house and down the porch steps. I feel the warmth of the morning sun on my face and hear Billy's quiet voice.

"Happy birthday, Chief," he says.

"Are you ready?" Renee asks, and I nod.

She takes her hand away, and I'm transported instantly to a clear night on First Beach two decades ago.

Renee and I sat together on a blanket by a fire lit from driftwood that night, the gentle rush of waves lapping at the sand, and I told her everything. I told her about my family, about our blood, about the Quileute and the blood-hunters. I told her how the Quileute used me to lure the vampires to the meadow. I showed her the scars on my arms, the damage that the needles make on my fair skin, explaining how my blood is used to lay a trail for the vampires to follow to the meadow, to me.

The wind whipped her hair around her face and she held it back, staring into the fire for a long time while she took it all in. I was sure she'd think I was insane. I thought she'd run screaming, but she did neither. She nodded, after a while, and took my hand.

"Well," she said, with a watery smile, "you're full of surprises."

I asked her to marry me that night, and here she still is, this woman who can still slay me with the warmth of her smile, who sacrificed her whole adult life waiting on a dream that may never quite come true. And in all that time, through all those long, lonely years she never once gave me a moment of doubt, never gave me a reason to think that she wouldn't wait for me forever.

I couldn't believe she said yes to me that night. I still can't.

"What would you do, Charlie," she asked me that night, "if you were someone else? If you were free to go wherever you chose to?"

"I wouldn't go anywhere," I told her. "I'd stay right here with you." I stretched out on the blanket and she nestled into my shoulder, and we looked up at the stars. James Island was out there, just beyond the breakers, but it seemed a long way away as I lay there, daring to dream of a future where anything was possible. "I'd buy a motor bike just like my grandfather rode, and I'd ride it through the forest to the Sol Duc, and I'd sit on a rock and drink beer, and fish all day." I took her hand and kissed it, her skin tasting faintly of salt carried on the ocean wind. "And I wouldn't look over my shoulder once."

Billy clears his throat, and I squint at the scene before me now. Standing in the middle of my backyard on a blue tarpaulin is a very old motor bike. It's a spare and simple machine, a BSA, just like my grandfather's bike.

"It's a 1964 B44 Victor Enduro," Renee says, "built the same year you were born. I thought maybe Jake could help you restore it, and I spoke to Sam and he can make my studio bigger. We could work in there together."

I nod, shoving my hands in my pockets and rolling on my toes a little, looking at the tarp at my feet, at the trees beyond my yard, at the blue sky above. Did I cry when my mother died? That was probably the last time, and I swallow heavily, trying not to now.

"Do you remember?" Renee asks anxiously.

I turn to her and take her in my arms, holding her close and whispering into her hair. "I remember, Renee, of course I remember."

Bella clears her throat after a while, and I let Renee go and turn to my daughter. She's holding something long and thin, wrapped in silver paper. It can only be one thing. I pull the paper off and inside is a royal blue fishing rod that stands as tall as I am. Bella hands me a tackle box and a cooler filled with Vitamin R, and I hug her too, not able to say much more than "thanks".

If I thought it would do any good, I would jump on that motor bike and ride away up into the mountains, and when I got there, I'd throw myself at the feet of the Cullens. I would beg and plead, bargain and promise, if they would just pack up and leave this place, leave my family to our simple dreams.

~~~ O ~~~

My yard looks like a fairyland. I've sipped on the beer from Bella's cooler all afternoon as we worked away, and now that night has come, the result of Renee's week of industry is there for us to see. We sit on the porch and take it all in.

Mason jars filled with candles hang from lines draped across the yard, and twinkle lights snake around the trunks and through the branches of the trees. Long tables covered with colored tablecloths are set on the marshy grass, on the very place where Renee's studio was marked out to be. Music plays, and platters of food and pitchers of punch, bobbing with fruit and ice, line the tables.

"Do you like it, Charlie?" Renee beams at me, lit brighter than the twinkling lights in the forest. Only she could light the edges of that dark place, and turn it into something beautiful.

"It's incredible," I say, kissing her hair, and her cheek. "Thank you." It doesn't seem like enough, but I know that if tonight is a good night, that if I'm happy and we're together, it will be enough for her.

People begin to arrive; people from work, and people from town, people from the Reservation. I take the last beer from the cooler, surprised there aren't more left, and drink it down, wipe my mouth, grit my teeth, and go to greet our guests.

~~~ O ~~~

Clusters of people are scattered in distinct groups across the yard. Renee carries a pitcher of punch around, trying to draw people together but the townsfolk and the Quileute have never mixed much. She catches my eye and shrugs, a sad smile. I know what she's thinking. If the people of Forks knew what they owed the Quileute, they'd fall over themselves with gratitude.

Now that I stand back and look, the group gathered around my motor bike is a big one. There are a lot of Quileute there. A lot. Too many. I sidle up to Billy.

"Lot of folks here," I say, nodding in the direction of Sam and Leah, Jake and Emily, Paul, Embry and Quill and some of the elders too, all laughing together. "Everything under control?"

"Relax, Charlie," he says. "There are a lot of people who aren't here, too." He pours me a shot of bourbon and I throw it back, the mellow warmth radiating through my limbs.

Bella has invited some friends from school for company, and they sit together at the end of one of the long tables, laughing together. Mike Newton sneaks a sip from the can of Vitamin R he has hidden under the table. I catch his eye, and he looks away, ducking his head.

Bella seems distracted, just as she always is lately, not really joining in the conversation. The shadows under her eyes grow darker with every passing day, and even though I can't see them in this light, I know they're there. Renee thinks maybe Bella is interested in a boy who may not be interested in her, and I wonder if she's right. There are three couples sitting round the table, but Bella sits alone, gazing at Billy and Jake across the yard.

Renee is dancing with Dave Newton, her skirt billowing around her legs as he twirls her to a song I haven't heard in years. When the music slows and our song begins, I cut in, and we slow dance to the mellow slide guitar and the years melt away. Renee whispers things in my ear that I like the sound of very much, and by the time the song is over, I'm ready to throw everybody out and take her upstairs for the rest of the night.

Is this what life is like for normal people? I see now, with a clarity and understanding I've never had before, why Renee fights so hard for it.

Bella is passing food around, looking a little happier, and I sip some punch. Renee asks me after a while if I know that sangria is full of wine, and the drink splashes down my shirt when I shake my head, but it tastes so good that I just keep on sipping. She just laughs, kisses my cheek, and pours me another drink.

The brittle edges have been smoothed from Renee's laughter tonight. She is radiant, happier than I've ever seen her, and it's easy to smile through her short speech. I thank everyone for coming, and mean it, and then we raise our glasses for a champagne toast. The crowd sings "Happy Birthday", and there's cake and candles. I blow them all out, and I suppose I make a wish, but I don't really remember what it is as soon as the thought is made.

I'm not much of a one for small talk, content to wander around smiling, and then Renee takes my hand and we dance together for a long time. It's hot, dancing, but I remember not to push my sleeves up, and I tell Renee over and over how much I love her.

It's really late, or maybe it's really early, before the night winds down. There are still a few stragglers who just won't leave, and Renee wanders around, bleary eyed, picking up empties and scraping food into the garbage bag in her hand. I should help her, but Dave Newton taps me on the shoulder.

"Come on, Chief," he says. "Have a drink with me."

I probably shouldn't, but what the hell. I never do this.

Dave pours me a drink and one for himself, and I knock it back. Billy appears from nowhere, and Dave pours another for me, and Billy takes a hit, too. The whisky sloshes around in my glass, and I raise it high until the candlelight from a Mason jar shines straight through it. "Their eyes," I say to Billy, clinking my glass clumsily against his. "Remember that? What Harry said that night?" I nod to myself. He remembers. "Let's toast their golden whisky eyes."

Billy puts a heavy arm across my shoulders. "Come on, Charlie. Let's go for a walk. Clear our heads."

"Good idea," Dave says, but Billy says something, I can't hear what, and it's just the two of us, Billy and me, who walk off toward the trees. I don't want to go into the forest, but Billy's arm is firm around my shoulder. I don't like this at all. I feel led, not invited, and the mellow high is over, replaced with something sour and brutal.

"Let's go for a walk," I say, mimicking Billy. "Sure, Billy, whatever you say. That's what I do, isn't it? Whatever you say, whatever Harry says. Point me in whatever direction you want me to go, stand me up in the meadow and take my blood. Put the needle in, Billy, let's paint the whole forest red. Let's call the vampires out to play."

"Charlie," he says, "you've had more to drink than you can handle."

"Fuck you, Billy. Fuck you and your Chief and his people. What's going on that you won't tell me about? Stop hiding behind your tribal bullshit, Billy. I think you could tell me if you really wanted to."

"Just keep walking, Charlie," he says, but I don't. I stop right where I am, and I turn on him, and for the second time in my life, I lose control.

"What are you hiding, Billy? I know you're hiding something. You better tell me what it is. You better fucking tell me what it is." He doesn't smell good, or maybe it's me, but either way, my stomach heaves. I'm too close to him, but when I try to move back, I stumble forward instead, and his chest is right there in front of me just begging for it, so I do it. I give it a shove. It feels good, and wrong, and I do it again. "You watch those vampires, and you watch me, and you watch my daughter. You know _everything_. What is it, Billy?"

There's someone else next to me. It is Dave? Or Jake? I think it's Jake. He's shoving his arm between us, pushing me away from Billy.

"Take it easy there, Charlie."

"What are you, twelve? You don't get to tell me what to do." I shove him too. "Get out of the way, Jake. Me and your daddy are having a talk." I try to push Jake's arm away but it won't budge, and when I turn on him, he's not there.

There's snarling black where he just was, and I'm drunker than I thought I was, drunker than I've ever been. I stagger back a little, and the black hole roars and growls, and there's pain in my arm, stinging and burning and blood everywhere, and I can't seem to do anything but stare at it. There are voices and Renee and Billy and something white that's quickly turning red wrapped around my arm.

My stomach heaves again as I realise where I am. I'm in the forest and I'm bleeding and I look up, real quick, from my red arm to the black trees, knowing she's not around but looking for red there, too.

I hear the words "blood" and "hospital" from somewhere far away and I try to bellow no, but I can't tell if the word comes out.

And then everything goes….

~~~ O ~~~

Black.

_Black._

I try to open my mouth, but my lips feel sewn shut. I can't feel my arm.

_Eyes._

"Charlie?"

Black eyes.

"Breathe, Charlie. You're fine. You're in Forks Hospital, and you're fine."

The eyes belong to Carlisle Cullen, his lips pursed with concentration, and his eyes focussed somewhere around my waist.

I try to sit up but his pale face swirls and blurs. I slump back against the pillows. A machine beeps rapidly behind me, and the sound of my breathing is harsh and too fast, my heartbeat pounding through my throat and into my head, like a drumbeat building towards a crescendo that I don't want it to reach. I want to close my eyes against the spinning but I can't look away from those eyes, and when I try to sit up again, the beeping accelerates wildly.

"You're fine, Charlie. You need to slow your breathing down a little. Nice, deep breaths, Charlie. You've lost a lot of blood, but I've almost got you stitched up now."

I feel something in my right arm, probably an IV, but I don't dare tear my eyes from his face.

"How're you doing there, Chief?" A voice comes from the other side of the bed, and its familiar timbre brings everything flooding back. The machine peaks again, riding high on a toxic cocktail of guilt and fear.

"Billy," I croak.

"Try and relax, Charlie," Carlisle Cullen says. "Almost done."

I glance down at my arm. Two rows of neat stitches march like ladders up my skin, and long, white fingers work at a third gash parallel to them.

"Jake? Was it Jake? Tell him it was my fault, Billy, make sure you tell him it was my fault."

"Tell him yourself, Charlie. He right here."

Another pair of dark eyes appears over Carlisle Cullen's shoulder.

"It's OK, Charlie," Jake says. "It's my fault. I just…. lost control." He smiles wryly, his eyes darting to Carlisle Cullen. "No blood, no foul."

"Renee?" I ask. "Where's Renee?"

"In the waiting room," Jake says, his eyes sliding again to the blond head next to his dark one. "We thought it'd be safer if she waited out there. You know," he shrugs, "just in case."

Carlisle Cullen sighs, his eyes flickering to Jake. "I appreciate what you're trying to do, but there's really no need for you to stand so close." He looks at me. "He thinks he needs to help mask your scent."

Jake shrugs. "It can't hurt, right? I mean, look at your eyes."

Carlisle Cullen scowls, and I close my eyes briefly as the room begins to spin again.

"Charlie, believe me when I tell you that you are in no danger from me, from any of my family, and neither is your daughter. Harming either of you is the very last thing we want to do."

I've never been this close to a vampire before, at least not one who wasn't trying to rip my throat out. Renee's drawings of Esme Cullen come to mind, and I try to view him objectively, to see what Renee saw. The skin is unnaturally smooth and white, pearlescent in lustre, his lips blood red against such a pallid background, but it's his eyes that hold me. Though black as night, they are not the eyes of someone troubled by anything in particular, let alone someone fighting to restrain himself from draining me dry. Those eyes are serene and peaceful, and he works away quietly, intent upon his work, seemingly calm and perfectly in control.

Billy puts a straw to my mouth, the cool water soothing my parched throat, and Carlisle's black eyes flicker to mine. "You're doing fine," he says.

The long silence is broken only by the electronic monitor, imperceptibly slowing until finally the sound of it doesn't frighten me anymore. Billy reclines in the shadows on the dark side of the room, the warmth from the lamp light trained on my injured arm comforting somehow.

"Is that lamp for show?" I ask.

Carlisle Cullen nods. I shift a little on the pillows, stretch my legs out a bit. Breathe.

"How old are you?" I ask.

He smiles briefly, but doesn't look up from my arm. "I'm three hundred and forty one years old," he replies. Jake whistles softly.

"You've been around a long time," I say. "How many people have you killed in your lifetime?"

He smiles again, this time looking me square in the eyes. "Not one," he says.

"You don't expect me to believe that, do you?"

"No," he says, "I don't, but your believing it or not has no bearing on the truth of it." He glances at Billy. "It might interest you to know that were my father here with us in this room, he'd want to kill all three of us, me and Jake and Billy."

"How's that?" Billy asks.

"He was a pastor who led witch hunts in the sixteenth century. Not just witches, though. He hunted for vampires and werewolves, all manner of supernatural creatures." He smiles wistfully. "I thought he was mad, chasing phantoms of his own invention but, as it turned out, he was right all along."

There is something soothing and hypnotic in the rise and fall of Carlisle Cullen's hand as he stitches me back together again, pulling the thread through my skin, tying it off, and beginning again. I know it will hurt later, but at this moment there is just numbness and a strange, unexpected sense of calm and, for now, I have no will to do anything but surrender to it.

"How did you come to have such a large family?" I ask.

"That's a long story," he says. "I lived alone for centuries, but there came a time when I couldn't bear the solitude any longer. I changed all of them but Jasper and Alice. It was weak of me, and selfish, but still, I did it. They would all have died had I not, Edward first, then my wife, then Rosalie and Emmett." The sadness is there in his eyes again, the same look that was there in the meadow when he told me that two of their number were leaving Forks. He sighs. "You understand something of loneliness, I think," he says, glancing from me to Billy. "Desperation is a powerful force. It compels us to do things that our rational selves would believe unthinkable." He catches my eye again. "You brought your daughter back here, Charlie, and your wife, despite the danger."

I don't answer, nor do I ask him how he knows these things about me. I feel weary and not quite present, and unwilling to hear anymore tonight. My vision blurs and I blink rapidly, trying to clear it, trying to stay awake. Carlisle finishes the stitches, coats my arm in antiseptic and cuts strips of white gauze and plaster, taping it snugly over my wounds.

"I gave you a local anaesthetic while you were unconscious," he says, "but that will wear off soon. I'll prescribe painkillers for you that the nurse will administer when you need them."

"Nurse?" I mumble. That single syllable comes out slurred, and I fight harder to stay awake.

"I'm keeping you in at least overnight," he says. "We'll see if you can go home in the morning."

I want to protest, I want Renee to come and take me home, but I can't make the words come out. I feel Billy's warm hand on my shoulder and his voice, from faraway. "It's OK, Charlie," he says. "I'll be here all night."

I try to turn toward him, to nod in gratitude and acknowledgement, but my head feels too heavy to move.

My thoughts grow dim, but through the sleepy haze I catch a glimpse of something unexpected in the distance, a chink of light no more than a hair's width across. In my mind's eye, I peer through that tiny sliver to see what lies beyond, and what I see there draws me closer, further in. A different world is revealed there- or maybe it's just a different view of this world - a place suffused with light that maybe, if I'm brave enough, might be within my reach.

There are few more vulnerable places a man can go than to sleep, and it's Carlisle Cullen's eyes, golden now, that are the last thing I see before I drift away.

~ O ~

Thank you so much for reading x


	14. Chapter 14

Thanks as always to Alby Mangroves, Annetteinoz and Lizf22 (all the neat ideas are hers). Love, love, love.

I struggled with this chapter for quite a while, so it took longer than I'd hoped to get it done.

Disclaimer: Stephenie Meyer owns everything.

~~~ Bella ~~~

The bucket bumps against my leg as I walk down the hall, the water sloshing almost to the lip of the plastic. I stand completely still, not breathing until the waves recede, and then try again to make it to the laundry. I worry as I tip the water into the laundry sink that a drop might splash on my clothes, and that I'll have to burn them, just like I burnt the bloody towel that was left by the front door. I pour the contents down the drain in a slow and steady stream, put the plug in the sink, run some water and add plenty of bleach, leaving the mop to soak.

The towel landed with a wet splat on the floor as Billy and Jake carried my father through the house early this morning, and I squeeze more bleach on the floorboards where it lay. I wonder if there's more blood. I grab a rag from the kitchen, and follow the trail they took through the back door and along the spine of the house, to the front door. Scrambling crab-like along the cool floorboards, I inspect the scatter rugs, scrubbing as I go, until I'm red-faced and panting, and still not satisfied.

The phone rings. My mother's voice, rough with worry and fatigue, sounds as though it comes from further away than Forks Hospital.

"He's fine, Bella," she says.

"I know, Mom." My hands stink of bleach, and I hold the phone away a little.

This is her third phone call, each of them to tell me the same thing. Her first garbled call came not long after they'd arrived at the hospital, my mother, high on alcohol and adrenaline, babbling as she told me over and over that my father was going to be fine. The second call came as dawn streaked pink across the sky. She sounded calmer then, but defeated somehow, hollow and lost in a way that was almost more frightening than the blood and my father's shredded arm.

"Is Sam still there?" she asks.

I run the tap in the kitchen and smother washing liquid all over my hands, lathering up and massaging the suds into my skin.

"No, he's gone home." He'd shooed everyone, including Leah, out of the house after Charlie was taken away, but I sent him back to La Push when the sun rose. I wanted him gone, wanted Edward, until I found the bloodstained towel by the front door. I was glad, then, that Sam had stayed and Edward hadn't come.

I say goodbye to Renee and rinse my hands off. The scent of bleach mixed with fake lemon isn't much better.

The phone rings again, Angela this time.

"Is he OK?"

"He's fine, Angela. He has a bunch of stitches, but he'll be fine."

"That's a relief," she says. "The whole town's talking about it. We don't usually get bears that close to town." Her tone is apologetic, as though she's somehow responsible for the attack on my father. "I'm really glad he's OK, Bella." She pauses. "A bunch of us are going to Port Angeles this afternoon. We thought we'd see a movie and there's this new ice cream place that Jess wants to go to. Are you up for it?"

"I think I'll stay here, wait till Mom gets home, get some sleep. Thanks for asking me though, and for calling."

"Sure," she says. "I'll see you tomorrow, I guess."

I warm some milk in the microwave and make a mug of hot chocolate, taking it out to the porch.

My mother willed the clouds away for Charlie's birthday, and while Sam and I silently cleared away the sagging remnants of my father's party, I tried to summon them back. Caught on the cusp of winter and spring, Forks seems to drift back and forth between the two seasons without warning. The time was past due for the clouds to roll back in, and sure enough there they are, hanging low and misty over the trees, dulling down the sun and shrouding the forest in humid mystery. I wonder how much blood was spilled on the forest floor, and how much rain it will take to wash it away.

Restless and jittery, and less tired than I should be, I cast around for something to pass the time. Renee has forbidden me to come to the hospital, wanting Charlie to rest, and I'm too wired to sleep.

There's not much to do but think.

Alice's vision dances in the center of my thoughts, as it so often does, the pivot point around which so many confused thoughts and feelings swirl and eddy. I feel torn and alone, going through the motions of making a decision that's already been made, despite what Edward says.

"Bella, I won't change you against your will," he said, the night before my father's birthday. "Somehow you must come to want it." His eyes were tight when he said that, his mouth a grim line, but I couldn't tell him what he wanted to hear.

I swallow the last mouthful of my drink, and head inside, discovering another drop of blood on the way, a ruby star on the silver-grey boards near the back door. I get the bleach, trying to imagine how I come to be lying in the meadow with Edward. It's hard to see a way forward, a clear path to tread. Everywhere I turn I see the image of my mother and father, grieving over an empty box in the ground.

I wonder why it's they who should pay the price of me loving Edward, wonder how I come to be lying happy in his arms, reconciled to it all.

Wonder what blood tastes like.

When I'm done scrubbing and my stomach has stopped heaving, I send Edward a text, typing out the words with clumsy fingers.

_Don't come tonight._

Before he has a chance to reply, I type out another quick message.

_Can I meet you somewhere?_

_Best not to_, is the quick reply.

I type a few more words, the one question I've wanted the answer to more than any other, and haven't had the courage to ask.

_Alice's vision – when?_

I stare at the words until they blur, searching for the will to press send, feeling my spirit dull and diminish as I delete the letters one by one.

Edward speaks of eternity and forever and always, but all I feel is time running out.

~~~ O ~~~

Charlie comes home pale and drawn, but with a spark in his eyes that's new. Just as the light in his eyes fires up, my mother's bright eyes fade. My father's brush with death seems to have shaken up everyone but Charlie, and Renee seems to need to cling to him even more than I do. She fusses and hovers over him, feeding him steak and making him rest, but the stooping set of her shoulders worries me.

I retreat to my bedroom, leaning on the windowsill as night falls. There are no stars again tonight, but still Edward won't come. I thought I was being neurotic and paranoid about the blood. I was so sure it would be safe tonight, but the persistent clouds have produced nothing more than a misty drizzle, not enough to wash away the blood from the forest floor and from my yard. It was Edward who sent the text this time. He won't risk it and, while I'm glad he's being cautious, the nights without him are long.

Renee comes in to say goodnight, a dish cloth over her shoulder and her hair pulled up high on her head. She's fidgety, not able to keep still, and I think of my grandmother. Charlie's mother was like that too, a tiny woman, like a bird with sharp eyes, and hands that were never still. We wrote each other every week from the time I could hold a pen, but I only met her once. She didn't like to fly and didn't leave her house much, but Charlie convinced her to come to Phoenix with him the summer I was twelve.

She told me stories about Forks and her family, about Charlie when he was a boy, her soft, lilting voice at odds with her small, quick movements. At night we knelt side by side at the foot of my bed, our matching beads clicking in time as we said a decade of the Rosary, her hands not still even in prayer. She taught me to knit, and left to go home to Forks long before I wanted her to, but she never once mentioned my grandfather.

Renee flutters around my room now like a bird in a cage, picking up laundry and straightening things that aren't crooked, and it strikes me as strange that she should remind me of Charlie's mother, and not her own.

"Mom," I say, "is there Quileute blood on Charlie's side of the family?"

Renee, staring at the drawing of the wolf on my wall that she drew so long ago, startles. "Quileute? No, Bella. No Quileute blood. Why do you ask?"

"No reason really. Just wondering."

She bends to pick up a stray sock at her feet.

"I never really knew how Charlie's father died," I say, watching her closely.

She rolls the sock around in her hands, and then lays it flat over her shoulder on top of the dish cloth. "He was killed in the forest, Bella. A mountain-lion, they think. We never really knew." She tightens her pony tail, yanking it so viciously that the sock falls to the floor. "Harry Clearwater's brother was killed too."

"Oh," is all I say, thinking hard. Renee plants a dry kiss on my forehead, leaves the sock where it is, and walks out before I can think what I want to ask next.

I snuggle down in the comforter, missing Edward but hoping to catch up on some sleep. It takes a long time to come though. I lay awake in the dark, hugging my pillow, wishing for the first time that I was that girl lying easy in the comfort of Edward's arms.

When I finally grow drowsy, my thoughts turn to the forest, and when I sleep, my dreams are of a girl with skin paler than my own, walking in that place that I am forbidden to go. She picks a slow trail over musty leaves and under black trees, their mossy branches reaching not for the sky, but for the girl lost and wandering beneath them.

When I wake, the dream stays with me and the pungent scent of peat and fir is so strong that, for a moment, I think I've woken in that dank, dense place.

My waking thought is the same as the one that sent me off to sleep, and I spend the day at school preoccupied, squinting into the line of trees that mark the end of the schoolyard, wondering what goes on in that dark place.

~~~ O ~~~

I hang my jacket on the hook inside the front door and lean against its solid warmth, tired, soaking wet, and glad to be home. My limbs feel heavy and my brain slow, but still the thoughts revolve in endless circles that are getting me nowhere. The light from the TV flickers faintly from the living room, and noises come from the kitchen, but I don't think either of them heard me come in through the roar of the rain. Maybe I can make it upstairs to their bedroom and sneak Renee's copy of the book out again.

The picture of the two old ladies may not still be there, but I don't need to see it again. I remember what it looked like, the two widows bent over their work, the words _Swan & Clearwater_ printed beneath, but there might be some other keepsake hidden between the pages of Renee's book, just like the orange blossom Edward gave me is hidden in mine.

I'm just about to take off, to risk it and sprint up the stairs when the screen door rattles at my back. I nearly jump out of my skin. When I open the door, Jake's face is distorted through the sagging mesh, a wall of water pouring from the porch roof behind him. The rain is fierce this afternoon, roaring strong enough to wash everything sparkling clean, and I smile. Surely Edward will come tonight.

Jake shakes the rain off like a dog when he comes inside, wary eyes watching me. He came here after school yesterday too, twitching on the porch step and cursing the misty drizzle that meant he couldn't mow the lawn for Charlie. I avoided him, spending the afternoon in my room catching up on homework.

He hangs his dripping jacket on the hook next to mine, pondering the puddle already forming on the floor, hands on his hips. I think of that night on First Beach when he appeared through the line of trees at the end of the sand, and told his unconvincing lies.

I have a thousand thoughts, a hundred disconnected pieces of information, and a dozen theories, and I'm tired of waiting for Edward.

"Jake," I say, my voice low under the rainstorm, "I wanted to thank you."

He looks up from the floor, his eyebrows drawn together, puzzled. "Thank me?"

"For Charlie. You and Billy saved his life. I want to thank you for that." I watch him closely, cataloguing every nuance of expression that crosses his face. I see some very interesting things there, before his guard goes up.

"Oh that," he says. "It was nothing, Bella. Don't mention it."

"Of course I'll mention it, Jake. It was incredibly brave of you and your Dad to risk your lives like that, fighting that bear off. Who knows what might have happened if you hadn't been there?"

He turns away, his ears red, and goes to walk off down the hall.

"Wait, Jake," I say. He doesn't turn for a moment, but I wait him out, a silent challenge until finally he turns to face me. "Thanks too for coming to help with the chores while Charlie's arm heals. It's really good of you to do that."

"No problem," he says, through clenched teeth. His eyes hold mine for a long beat, my expression neutral as he fights again to bury his emotions. He doesn't quite manage it this time either, and all the things I expect to see there, anger and guilt, flit through his eyes.

Still I'm not sure, until Renee appears.

"Jake," she says, a thin smile tight on her face. "You're here again."

"Just thought I'd see if there's anymore jobs need doing that the Chief can't manage."

Renee glances into the living room. "Thanks, Jake, but it seems like he can handle the remote with one hand." Her eyes dart to mine, her strained smile hard to look at, and she turns back to the kitchen. Jake follows her, their low voices not quite carrying to the living room, where Charlie sits oblivious.

His eyes are trained on the television, and he doesn't seem to notice when I sit next to him. Some game show host is quacking on the screen, but Charlie isn't listening. He's lost in thought, the remote hanging slack from his injured arm, the fingers of his other hand tracing lines down his moustache over and over again.

I zone out the noise too, and twirl my hair around and around my fingers, thoughts click-clacking in my head as though I'm flicking through index cards, searching for clues. When I catch our reflection in the TV screen, we are mirror images of each other, both leaning forward and staring with unfocused eyes at the TV, slow hands helping us think.

~~~ O ~~~

Finally Jake is gone, Renee and Charlie are sleeping, and Edward is here. The rain has eased to a comforting hum in the background and he stands rigid against the wall, his hair wet and dark, watchful eyes gleaming at me from across the room. A single droplet of water runs down his cheekbone, tracing a pattern over his skin and I watch it, fascinated and envious.

Edward doesn't say a word, doesn't take a step, and when I begin to rise from my bed, he stops me with a look. For the first time I notice the fists at his sides, pumping to the rhythm of my heartbeat, as they haven't done since the beginning. His eyes are wicked black and burning, and he's all rangy limbs and wet skin, sparking danger that ignites my blood and fires up my heartbeat. His voice snaps through the silence like a whip.

"I'm sorry, Bella," he says through clenched teeth. "It's almost like beginning again."

It takes a moment for me to understand him, but then I realize. The long break from being near me has weakened his will or reignited his thirst, or both, and his battle begins anew.

I want to cry with frustration. Right now, in this moment, I would let him change me just for the salve he could provide, for the unrestrained comfort he could give were it not for the blood pumping through my veins. The walls feel like they're folding in on me. Even the forest feels too close, as though the trees outside are leaning in at precarious angles, their branches clawing like fingers at the roof to get at me.

Can it truly be love when he's in the same room as me, only inches away, and loneliness is all I feel?

My first instinct is to send him away. The frustration of having him so close and still out of reach is almost more than I can stand, but I know that the only way we can be close again is to wait it out.

So, resigned and helpless, that's what we do.

I perch on the bed, and he leans by the window, completely still other than those flexing fists. His jaw is rigid, his silent mouth tight, his black, determined eyes fixed on mine. Time creeps on and I try to hold fast, but the room is too warm and the rain drums gently on the roof like a lullaby. As the night wears on, I begin to doze, hoping as my eyelids grow heavier that Edward's will is stronger than mine.

I wake at dawn, tipped sideways from where I sat on the edge of my bed, fully clothed, untouched and alone.

There's no other way to get to the other side, so I trudge through the days alone and wait through the nights with Edward, hoping it won't take long for him to get control, grateful that at least he's in the room with me.

Finally, on the fourth night, he speaks.

"Bella," he says, "I'm so sorry. Are you alright?"

I shake my head, and the words that have been dammed up inside me for a week come pouring out.

"It was scary, Edward. I've never seen anyone injured like that before." I shake my head slowly, twisting my hair around my fingers in tight circles. "There was a lot of blood. A lot. I thought he'd probably die, and I wondered for a moment if it might be better for him if he did." I untangle my hair, teasing out the knots, and begin twisting again. "Not better for my mother, of course, but for him. Or maybe I was being selfish, thinking it might be easier for me."

I glance up at Edward, feeling the weight of his watchful eyes, wanting him to cross the room, wanting to feel the burn of his singular touch so badly. I try to catch my breath. The jolt from the nights of taut silence, from holding everything in to letting it all out, is jarring, but I can't hold it in for another moment.

"And then when I knew he'd be OK, it was a different kind of scary. He was so pale when they carried him past me, Edward. He was as white as a ghost. Bloodless. That's what I kept thinking. He looked bloodless, and I felt like Alice might feel, like maybe I was seeing a glimpse of my future."

"Bella, not your father. We – my family, me - we would never let that happen."

"No, not my father." I shake my head slowly. That possibility is unthinkable. "But someone, Edward. Someone's father or sister or daughter. Someone."

"It doesn't have to be that way, Bella. It can be done, it _has _been done. My father, my sister; neither of them have ever killed a person. It can be done."

"Two out of seven." I smile weakly. "Not good odds."

He's looking at me like I'm something dangerous, as though I might be the one to hurt him, and I wonder hopelessly how any of us can come out of this unscathed.

"The odds are better than that. Jasper and Alice weren't born to our way. You will be, Bella. You will have all of us with you, helping you. I'll stop you, Bella, if you can't stop yourself."

"Can I talk to one of them? Can you bring one of them here one night?" I ask. "Your father or your sister?"

Edward's eyes dart to the window. "That's probably not a good idea," he says.

My eyes follow his, questioning. "The wolves?"

"Best not to push our luck," he says.

"Why would they care? They let you come." I cannot stop the scornful tone creeping into my voice, and Edward's eyes snap from the window to me. "I don't understand them," I mutter.

"Bella," Edward says, his tone laden with weary patience, "I would gladly give up hearing every other mind in existence forever in exchange for a single minute of hearing yours."

"They try to pass themselves off as friends when they're anything but." My eyes narrow. "It's different to what you do. You withhold things, definitely, but I don't think you've ever lied to me outright. They have."

His eyes widen, a telling silence, but I just shrug. He's never pretended to be anything other than what he is. Even from the beginning, from the first moment I laid eyes on him in Port Angeles as that van came screaming toward me, it was obvious that he was something other. He never tried to hide it, not from me anyway.

Besides, he made no promises.

_I won't answer everything, Bella. I promised I wouldn't lie to you, and I won't, but there are things that are not mine to tell._

That's what he said to me, and he's given me no reason to doubt him. I feel calmer now, more rational and so ready to share what I think I know.

"I don't understand why they didn't try to protect me from you." His head whips up, and I realize he was right to be scared of me, that I _have_ hurt him. "I don't mean I wanted them to, Edward, just that I don't understand it. The book says that you're sworn enemies, that it's their duty and privilege to protect people like me from people like you, and yet here you are, climbing in my window every night."

"Bella," he says, "it's more complicated than that."

"I know that, Edward." He stills for a moment, listening, and I curse myself for speaking so loudly. I hear the bathroom door open and close, and we wait, Edward's eyes trained on mine as the minutes pass. Finally he relaxes, and gives me a pointed look.

"When you did get here, Edward?" I whisper. "When did you first come to Forks? It was just before I first saw you in Port Angeles, wasn't it?"

He nods slowly.

"Not long after my father had some kind of emergency at La Push with the Quileute," I say.

There's still so much I don't know, the meaning behind those mysterious scars and the old lady's cryptic words still hidden, but things are beginning to make a kind of sense. I know I'm right about this. My father is a cop and Billy is his best friend. They're like brothers. If I'm capable of putting this together, I don't for a second imagine that my father isn't. And Billy and Jake were with him in the forest on Saturday night, just like Harry Clearwater was with my grandfather when he was killed.

"It wasn't a bear that attacked my father, was it? It was Jake."

A slow smile spreads across his face, and he nods.

"Edward," I whisper, smiling too, "my father knows, doesn't he? He knows everything. He knows all about the Quileute, doesn't he, and he knows all about you too."

~~~ O ~~~

He crosses the room slowly, testing himself. I want to tell him to stop, that it's too soon, but his face is set in sharp, determined angles that make me feel a little safer. He knows better than me what he's capable of and I have to trust him.

I twist my fingers, waiting restlessly until finally he's close enough to touch. He moves slowly, finally _here_. He runs the pad of his thumb along my cheek and over my bottom lip, my skin burning from the touch of his, and I sigh, relieved. I touch his hand and his face, feeling connected to him in a way that I haven't before. The desolate isolation fades away under his cool fingers as they move to my hair, brushing it from my shoulders, exposing my throat. He stares, transfixed for a moment, at the pulse that throbs there, and then his eyes lock on mine.

"I don't want to be this," he mutters, raking a hand through his hair, and then, "It's so good to be close to you again."

"I've missed you," I say, and he lifts my hand to his lips, kissing my palm and my wrist.

"Bella," he whispers, "it took everything I had to stay away."

"Was whatever remained of my father's blood really that dangerous to you?"

"No," he says, "but it would have been to you. It's hard to explain, but if you weren't here that blood wouldn't have bothered me too much." He sighs. "I think that's a conversation for another time, Bella, when I'm feeling more in control."

I store his words away to mull over later when I'm alone, saving them like a miser adding a coin to a pile of gold. That is a conversation I will make sure we have, but for now, my head feels light and clear for the first time in weeks. Even with Edward so close, it's hard to think of anything but my father.

"I was going to beg you," I say, "to change my mother and father too. I just couldn't imagine disappearing, faking my own death…. I couldn't imagine doing that to them." I shudder, relieved beyond measure that whatever other obstacles there are to overcome, it won't come to that.

"I don't know if I could have loved you like I do if you'd been able to just walk away from them," he says.

"How much does he know about you?"

"We've talked," he says, "several times. I wouldn't say we're great friends, Bella, and I don't imagine for a moment he'll be happy about us."

"We still have a ways to go," I say, and he nods.

"Would you have told me about Charlie if I'd asked?"

"No," he replies, "I wouldn't."

"What if I asked, knowing what I do now, about his role in all of this, about the scars on his arms? Would you tell me?"

"No," he says again, "I wouldn't."

"Why not?" He scowls a little. "I'm not pushing, Edward. I'm not asking you to tell me, I'm just curious about why you won't."

"For the same reason that you've never asked me to, because that's something for your father to tell you when he feels the time is right," he says, "and because you don't need me to tell you anyway."

"I don't?"

"Think about it, Bella. You invited me in because you wanted information from me."

"At first," I say.

"At first," he agrees, smiling a little. "But you don't need me for that. You've figured everything out on your own right from the start."

I smile at the truth of what he's saying. It feels like a triumph of sorts, as though taking the harder road to the knowledge I've craved, however incomplete it may be, has been worth something more than just the knowledge itself. He has allowed me, in his strange way, with every unsaid word, to regain some of the dignity that was stripped away.

Edward's face is contemplative, watching me as he runs the back of his hand gently over my cheek. I turn my face into his hand, marvelling at how the lightest touch of his cool skin on mine warms my blood.

"I will tell you something about your father, Bella," he says. "He has an unusual mind, one I've never seen the likes of before. Everything he does and says and thinks and feels is filtered through an image, like a hologram, a face that floats at the forefront of his mind. He sees everything through it and everything he does is because of it, and for it." He pauses, his cool lips pressed briefly to my forehead. "He is a man with a great capacity for love."

"My mother's face," I say, nodding, the thought pleasing me. "He adores her."

"No," he says, shaking his head, "it's not your mother. Bella, it's you."

~~~ O ~~~

Thanks so much for reading. x


	15. Chapter 15

Thanks as always to Liz, Alby and Annette for all the chats and WC's and emails and patience while I nut this thing out.

Disclaimer: Stephenie Meyer owns it all.

~~~ Bella~~~

The day dawns crisp and clear, the kind of morning where fat raindrops throw sparkling shards of sunlight, and everything feels cleaner and looks brighter. A wispy haze of silver steam rises from the forest, vanishing as it reaches the sky, and my tires sound satisfyingly industrious as they swish along the asphalt. I've quit my job at Newton's to spend those hours in the afternoon catching up on sleep, and it feels good to be going somewhere other than school or home.

I turn the radio down low and ease my foot off the gas a little, wanting this moment of quiet simplicity to last. I turn onto the 101, wind my window down, and leave Forks behind for a while.

If I kept a list somewhere - a note hidden with Edward's gifts under my floor or a pad of lines tucked beneath my pillow - of all the things that scare me about Alice's vision, there would be a couple of things crossed off that list now.

Charlie and Renee know.

_They know_.

Part of me wanted to bound down the stairs this morning and hug them both and jump and shout, "I know, too. Isn't it amazing and scary and incredible and look – _look_ – I found my soul mate too, just like you both did."

Not so long ago I might have dreamed it was possible. I would have imagined Charlie clapping Edward on the shoulder, saying "Welcome to the family, son" and Renee's eyes shining with joy. I'd go shopping in Port Angeles with my mother and we'd pick out a white dress, and we'd have a huge celebration, and no one would notice that Edward never ventures out of the shadows.

Maybe I'm finally growing up, because there is fantasy and there is reality, and it seems that now I can tell the difference.

I ease the truck through the tunnel of trees and around a sweeping curve, squinting against the flickering shadows. The mountains are hidden from view by the dense forest on either side of the highway, but I feel them somehow, ominous and watchful. Edward lives with his family in those mountains, high in the mist that stands guard over their secret. When he leaves me each night, he disappears into that murky world, a place of shapeless mystery under the dripping moss, a place inhabited by people with improbable names who have somehow become a family, despite their strange beginnings.

It's a place I visit often in the most vivid of my imaginings, but I have gained enough wisdom to know that the world I've conjured in my mind will surely bear no resemblance to what life is really like on that mountain.

The forest thins out, and the landscape flattens out and opens up as Port Angeles looms, the bay sparkling blue in the morning sun.

I make a few wrong turns, but once I get my bearings the little shop is easy to find. It's right where Edward said it would be, facing north and tucked between a travel agent and a bookshop. A black and white striped awning protrudes over the sidewalk to protect shoppers from the rain, and the window beneath houses a display of pretty, shiny things. A bunch of small golden bells, their brightness dulled with age to a mellow patina, hang on stain ribbons from the door handle, tinkling as I enter.

Inside, polished oak shelves are lined with silver photo frames and glossy books, bottles filled with fragrant oils and pastel pots of creams and lotions. Silk scarves hang from wrought iron hooks, above piles of delicate linens and quilts in shades of sage and rose. It is like stepping into a different world, but just as I thought, nothing like the one I imagined. It's an intensely feminine world of elegance and beauty, heavily scented with sandalwood, and wood smoke, and luxury.

There is no one in the shop this early on a Sunday morning, save for the figure crouched before a small fireplace in the corner. Even though the day isn't cold, she is warming her hands before the flames, her fingers closer to the fire than I could bear mine to be. Her caramel hair shines bright by the glow of the fire and, after a moment, she rises gracefully. She comes toward me with a warm smile, her hand extended in greeting.

"Bella," she says, as I take her hand, "Edward told me you'd be coming. I'm so happy to meet you at last." She gestures to the door behind me. "Why don't you flip the sign so we won't be interrupted?" Her voice is melodic and mellow, and her golden eyes are warm and mesmerising.

Even though Edward told me she was only 26 when she was changed, still I'd pictured her as closer to my mother's age than my own. Whatever her age, she is compelling and beautiful, and I feel more at ease with her than I would have thought possible.

It's hard to believe she's a killer.

I turn the sign on the door from "Open" to "Closed", and flick the lock.

"Edward said you wouldn't mind if I talked to you about a few things," I say.

"I'd be so pleased to help, Bella, if I can." She laughs a little. "Goodness, I'm nervous. Edward has a way of making even a simple conversation seem very dramatic."

"He makes you nervous too?"

"Not usually, but he's anxious about us meeting. He's worried I'll say something to scare you off."

"I'll be alright," I say. "Apparently I don't scare easily."

She laughs again, a warm throaty sound that's irresistible.

She takes my hand again, her skin a little cooler now, and leads me behind the counter and through a door into a small room at the back of the shop. There is a small kitchenette, spotless and gleaming, with a bench stacked high with bags of coffee beans and small boxes of tea bags, bottles of juice and cans of soda, sparkling water and still water, and pastries and muffins.

Esme gestures to a small square table with bentwood chairs on either side of it. There are flat cushions on the chairs made from fabric that I instantly recognize.

"My mother's design?"

Esme nods. "I looked her up online out of curiosity, and fell in love with her work. She's a very talented woman." She smiles, gesturing again to one of the chairs. "Why don't you sit, Bella, and get comfortable. Would you like a drink or some breakfast? I wasn't sure what you'd like so I got one of everything."

There is something tender and endearing about her attentiveness, and I begin to try and see things as she might. Edward told me that she lost the only child she ever had in her human life, and was so heartbroken that she attempted suicide. Carlisle, half in love with her already from a chance meeting years before, came across her broken body and had been unable to let her die. He changed her, and they've been inseparable ever since. Still, Edward said, she has never quite recovered from the death of her baby, and she fusses and clucks over her surrogate family like a broody mother hen.

It must be difficult for her to watch Edward leave every night, retreating from her world and disappearing into mine. My mother has always said that all she wants is for me to be happy, and while I think I make Edward feel many things, I don't believe that happiness is one of them.

I ask for a glass of lemonade, not sure my stomach can handle much else, and we sit.

I don't know what to say or where to begin. The things I hope to speak to her about seem too big to just launch into. For all her warmth and friendliness, and even with her eyes, golden as Edward's so seldom are, she is still a complete stranger. I twist my hands, feeling shy and uncertain. Esme watches me carefully for a moment, and then, just as the silence becomes awkward, relaxes back into her chair.

"You must have a look around the shop before you go," she says. "I wasn't sure how a store like this would work in Port Angeles, but business has been really good."

She chats away of everyday things, telling me how she's employed two staff to run the shop while she concentrates on buying stock online from her house. She doesn't like to be away from home much during the day because her husband prefers to work nightshift at the hospital, and they don't like to be apart too much. She asks me about Phoenix and about school, and how I like Forks, and even though I know it's a very deliberate attempt to put me at ease, it still works.

"My family is mostly very happy here, too" she's saying. "Particularly Emmett. We were living in Europe before we came here, but Emmett prefers North America. He loves being near the woods. It was he who chose this place as our next home, and we're thankful that he did."

It's a deft segue, and I shoot her a grateful look. She smiles and refills my glass, fussing with the bottle and the lid, filling the awkward pause again, while I gather my thoughts.

"Thanks," I say, sipping my drink, but still the words won't come. I look into her eyes, warm and patient, take a deep breath, and just blurt out the first thing that comes into my head. "I just feel so rushed. I feel like Edward is in a hurry, and I think I know why but I'm too scared to ask, and forever seems terrifying, and how do I know he'll be around for all of it?"

Esme smiles, a small sympathetic offering. "That's a lot to have on your mind, Bella. Let me see what I can help you with." I take the lid off the lemonade bottle to have something to do with my hands, while Esme watches me closely.

"First of all," she says, "time isn't something to be afraid of, Bella, at least having too much of it isn't. Have you ever lain under a clear sky at night and looked at the stars?"

I think of that night at First Beach by the driftwood fire, lying back gazing at the stars, and wishing for love. I smile wryly, and nod.

"It's a beautiful sight," she says, "but I've always found if I look for too long, if I really begin to think about what I'm looking at – the distance and the space and the time – it becomes overwhelming and frightening. Don't look too far ahead, Bella. Time is nothing to be afraid of. It's nothing but a series of moments, just like this one."

I sit back in my chair, relaxing a little. Her lilting voice and soothing words are working magic on me, and when I think about what she's saying, I feel calmer than I have in a long time. "That makes sense," I say. "I'll try to remember that."

I take another sip of lemonade, my mouth dry. "Edward says I will wake wild for blood," I say, flipping the lemonade lid around my fingers. "It's hard to imagine."

"It will happen," she says. "Whatever the gaps in Alice's knowledge are, that one thing is certain. It doesn't mean you will give in to it though."

"You did," I say.

"Yes, I did. It's not easy, Bella, not at first, but it can be done. It _has _been done."

"Edward couldn't do it either. He killed."

"Yes, he did," she says. "His ability is a curse as much as it's a gift, Bella. Could you hear the intentions of someone with a mind for murder, and stand by doing nothing?"

I shrug. "Maybe not."

"We made mistakes when we were young," she says. "but we're better at it now. Would it help you to know that of the two in my family who were the last to be changed, Rosalie has never killed, and Emmett only once? They've learnt from our mistakes, Bella, and you will too."

Her words echo Edward's, and they are of as little comfort to me as his were. Even if I succeed where they've failed, it's still a thing to be gotten through, a torture to be endured. I don't relish the thought, but I remember Esme's other words too. I focus on the here and now, and it helps a little.

"You seem….," I pause, searching for the right words, "more at ease with me than Edward does."

"Yes," she says, "it's much more difficult for him, Bella."

I nod and shrug. "My blood."

"Well, there's that, but that's difficult for all of us. Your blood sings to us all, but for Edward it hums an altogether more intoxicating tune."

"What do you mean?"

"Oh Bella," she says, "I love you already because Edward does, but to me your blood is just your blood. It's not without a struggle, but I can resist. To him, it's so much more than that. It's bound up with his love for you so tightly that its call is stronger to him than it could ever be to anyone else."

"I feel bad for him," I say. "Guilty almost, like I'm torturing him every minute he's with me, without intending to."

"Believe me when I tell you, Bella, it's the sweetest torture of his existence, and not a thing he would ever willingly walk away from. Besides," she says, "you're good for him in ways I'll bet you haven't even realized."

"I am?"

"He has to work when he's with you. He has no idea what you're thinking, or what you're going to say next, or why you're saying it. It's a source of great amusement to the rest of my family." She beams when speaking of these mysterious figures. It's a strange thought to me that these people who know Edward so much better than I do, might one day be more familiar to me, more my family, than either of my parents.

"But more than anything else, Bella, he's afraid."

"Afraid?"

"He believes that you have a fatalistic attitude to what Alice saw, that you're trying to talk yourself into something that you don't really want. He regrets deeply telling you of it, and he's haunted by how Alice's vision might come to pass if you remain undecided."

I gasp, the meaning of her words instantly clear. The possibility hasn't even remotely occurred to me. "He wouldn't," I say, but there is a creeping note of doubt in those two words that frightens me.

Esme's eyes narrow slightly, and I feel as though I've failed her somehow. The room feels too warm, and the scent that seemed heady and luxuriant when I first arrived, feels heavy and cloying now.

"I don't believe he would ever change you against your will, Bella, and nor does he, but the possibility of it tortures him."

"You said he regrets telling me? Why did he then?"

"Oh Bella, there's so much you don't understand about us. We deny our natures, we fight against what we are but at our core, at the heart of it all, you must never forget that we are vampires. When Edward gets too close to you, his instincts threaten to overpower him. He fights not just against your blood, but against his power to have you in his thrall, should he choose to do so."

She delivers these words in the same measured tone that she talked about juggling her work schedule so that she has enough time with her husband, and it's that, more than the sinister meaning behind her carefully chosen words, that sends a cold shiver shuddering up my spine. For all my naivete, there's never been a moment's doubt in my mind that I am completely at Edward's mercy, but hearing it spoken out loud, in this matter-of-fact way, gives me chills.

"You break my heart in so many ways," Esme says, "you and Edward both. You're both haunted by fear, governed and controlled by it, and while I understand it, still it makes me sadder than I can say. You are both so scared, and that's no way to fall in love."

She rises from her seat and takes my empty glass to the sink, rinsing and drying it with easy efficiency. It strikes me for the first time that perhaps I'm being tested in some way, and I wonder if Edward was right to be worried about this conversation.

"I trust him," I say. "I want you to know that. I don't believe he'd ever do anything to hurt me. I believe that if Alice's vision comes to pass, it's because I choose it, of my own free will." I raise my chin, determined and confident. "I believe that."

She turns, the warmth in her eyes still there, but an echo of something sad and fragile on her beautiful face now.

"You asked about eternity earlier," she says. "You asked how you can know if Edward will be with you forever. I don't know if I've been much help to you this morning, but I can answer that question without reservation." She crosses the small room and crouches at my feet, clasping my hands in hers, her skin as cold now as Edward's. "You must never doubt Edward's constancy. You must understand that when our kind fall in love, we fall forever. There is nothing mightier than the bond between a vampire and his mate. Nothing. There can be no other for him than you. You hold all the power, Bella," she says. "It's all up to you."

~~~ O ~~~

I don't go straight home from Port Angeles. The atmosphere in my house is heavy and strained, and I cast around for somewhere to go where the air is clear, and I can think. I drive aimlessly for a while, heading along the 101, through Forks and out the other side. My old red truck putters along the ocean road like it knows the way, and I find myself at First Beach without ever really deciding to go there.

It feels like the right place to be. Birds wheel and swoop overhead, calling to each other before diving at the ocean, and the open sky over the water is clear and blue. The space and the solitude are just what I need, and I lay my jacket on the damp sand and sit, hugging my knees, and breathing in the ocean air.

I mull over my conversation with Esme, unsure if it really helped much. Her focus was on Edward, as it should be, and there were things, I'm sure, that were left unsaid. She seemed as cavalier as Edward did about what will happen if I'm changed, and it's clear to me now that there can be no guarantees that I won't kill. It's not an easy thing for me to accept, and I wonder about paying a visit to the Forks Hospital to speak to Carlisle Cullen.

A figure appears in the distance near the point. Dark haired and tall, hunched into a hoodie, trudging in an arc that follows the shoreline. I'm not sure if it's a coincidence that Jake's here or not, but for the first time in weeks, I'm glad to see him. He draws nearer, seemingly surprised to see me, and sits next to me on the sand, his eyes red-rimmed and bloodshot.

"Are you OK?" I ask.

"Not really." He wipes his hand across his eyes. "Old Quil died this morning."

"Oh Jake, I'm so sorry. I didn't know him, but I'm really sorry to hear that."

"You saw him once. That night with Emily in the store? He was the one you saw there."

"Oh," I say. I remember so clearly that night at the Reservation with Emily, when she took me to the store, the night Charlie and Renee dragged me out to La Push. I remember the old man with his younger looking wife, the inexplicable look of respect and gratitude in his eyes, and the lies Emily told me afterwards. "I remember him," I say.

Jake looks younger and more vulnerable than I've ever seen him look, and I feel even worse for trapping him yesterday. Edward told me some things last night. His reluctance to share whatever my father is hiding from me doesn't extend to the Quileute, and it certainly doesn't extend to letting me believe things that just aren't true.

"Jake," I say, "I owe you an apology."

"Do you?" His voice is flat and dull, like he's not really interested in what I have to say. I say it anyway.

"I thought you'd attacked Charlie, and I know now that you didn't, and I know you tried to cover things up, but I didn't understand why."

I hesitate, thinking of Edward and our seclusion, of the strange and wonderful hours we spend together between dusk and dawn, ours alone. Daylight is creeping in, encroaching on our refuge, first with Esme, and, if this conversation goes any further, with Jake. I don't feel ready for it, but time is speeding up and gathering force, unforgiving and merciless.

I cross the line.

I say his name.

"Edward told me that you don't have a choice, that your Chief… that Harry has some kind of control over what you can say."

Jake doesn't reply, doesn't react. He knows all about Edward. He knows he comes to my room every night, but when he looks at me, his eyes are dull and flat. I remember that look in his eye. I've seen it before. He spoke to me right here on this beach when he covered up about the old ladies at La Push, and I remember how a part of me knew, even then, that Renee and Charlie were somehow involved.

It's so hard to comprehend, but Edward told me that it has always been that way with the Quileute. It's difficult, he said, to read their minds, that their thoughts are muffled and muted, but it can be done.

"I don't really understand it all, Jake, but I'm sorry anyway."

I can't read his expression. There's nothing in his eyes, and his face is closed and hard.

"Look, Jake, I don't know what you all do to my father out in that forest, but I've seen those scars on his arms. I can only assume it's something he does willingly."

Something occurs to me then, something I hadn't thought of until now. I've thought all along that those scars were from injections, that something was going into Charlie's veins, but maybe there's another possibility.

What if the needles are used to take something _out_?

I clutch at Jake's arm, snatched phrases rising from my memory, the idea exploding and reverberating through my mind.

_You are Quileute in your blood, Isabella Swan, just like your father, just like your grandfather._

_You will save our sons, Isabella Swan._

My blood.

My father's blood.

_Our _blood.

"You take his blood, don't you, Jake? You take Charlie's blood?"

He turns to look at me full in the face, but he doesn't say a word.

"God, Jake, I wish you could tell me."

"You won't have to wait long," he says.

He squints out at the ocean. James Island looms in the distance, rising beyond the breakers like some monolithic monster emerging from the ocean depths. Angela told me that night by the fire that the Quileute warriors are buried out there, generations of fighting men resting silent in the cool earth, just as my grandmother lies beneath a worn stone in Forks Cemetery.

"Old Quil will be taken out there soon," Jake says, nodding toward James Island.

"He wasn't really that old, was he?"

Jake doesn't say anything, he just keeps staring out at the ocean.

"Edward told me what happens with the phasing," I say. "He told me what it does to the body."

It's impossible to look at Jake when I say this, and I, too, look out at James Island. Even today, hunched on the beach, small and sad, Jake is still somehow larger than life. It's hard to believe that he'll die young, that every time his body is torn apart by the quaking transformation from man to wolf, he dies a little. The tearing explosion of muscle and sinew, the expansion and contraction of bones and organs destroy his body bit by bit, until finally he can take no more, and the rapid ageing begins.

Jake startles me when he speaks.

"Your father is the Forks Chief of Police," he says, frowning at the horizon.

"Yes," I say, not sure what he's getting at.

"I wonder who'll take over from him," he says.

"I don't know, Jake," I say, staring hard at this profile. "Dave Newton, I guess."

"Yeah," Jake says, nodding. "Dave Newton. He seems the obvious choice to be the next Chief."

He looks at me hard then, and although his dark eyes give nothing away, his mouth is open and searching, looking for words that he cannot say. I wish, just for this moment, that Edward's gift was mine.

There's meaning behind what he said, I know there is. Is he trying to find a way around the control Harry has over him? I hold my breath, waiting and hoping for more, but Jake looks away.

My thoughts whirl and blur, and I play it all out in my head, moving pieces around like I'm playing some crazy game of chess, godlike, omnipotent and merciless.

My father and Dave Newton. I've never seen Dave anywhere near the Quileute, and Edward has never mentioned him. I don't believe Dave Newton has anything to do with this. It has to be an oblique reference to something else.

I knock him off the board.

One pawn gone.

If not Dave Newton, if not my father, then who?

I bring other pieces into play.

Old Quil, the foot soldier, dead. Another pawn gone.

Edward, strong as stone, my protector. A rook.

And me, a pawn in a game I don't understand.

Chiefs and succession plans. Is that the essence of what he was saying? My father is the Forks Chief of Police, but the Quileute look to their own chief before they look to mine.

My father and Harry.

Two Chiefs.

Two kings, facing off across the board.

But for how long?

My father has no plans to retire, no plans to leave Forks. That's not what Jake meant.

It hits me then, taking my breath away, and the final piece slides into place.

Billy.

My father's best friend.

Harry's second in command.

The bishop, waiting to take over should the king fall, free to speak and act as he chooses.

I turn to Jake, my stomach churning like the ocean waves.

"Jake, how old is Harry?"

Jake rises, brushing the sand from his hands. He takes a long look at James Island, pulling the hood up over his head and plunging his hands deep into his pockets. He looks down at me, sitting at his feet. I look up him, squinting against the sun, trying to see his face.

"Harry's the same age as Quil was," is all he says, and then he walks away.

~~~ O ~~~

The world has opened up for me in ways I never could have imagined, revealing it's secrets in slivers and chapters, lit not by the steady beam of a spotlight, but instead by the flickering flame of a sputtering match. But just as it's opened up, so it has also narrowed in the spaces that I occupy. I look around my room. Sometimes I feel like a crazed cartographer, as though I could put a blindfold over my eyes and map every mark on the walls, chart the hills and valleys of each chip in the woodwork and follow the meandering path of every crack in the ceiling. The four walls, the ceiling, and the floor; sometimes it feels like a prison, and sometimes like paradise.

Esme's words turn in my head, around and around, picking up some of Jake's words as they go, like a slow Ferris wheel gathering passengers as it turns. The old lady's dark eyes, ancient and knowing, peer at me from the shadows, and her words join the circle as it gathers speed, faster and faster, until my head is filled with too many babbling, chattering voices.

I jump from my bed, and stride to the window, opening it wide to let the cool air in, trying to cast the voices out. Slowly the sun slides away, and I wait, feeling calmer, while the charcoal dusk, flat and shallow, turns to something deeper and darker. I welcome it, wanting its refuge from the trials of the day.

I saw Charlie through new eyes at dinner tonight, questioning everything I thought I knew about him. The euphoria of learning of my parents' knowledge of the Quileute and the Cullens has long since passed, driven away by the lessons of this long day. There's tension between my mother and him, and his birthday present sits untouched in the yard, abandoned just like my mother's studio. They can't seem to get a foothold in their new life together, and I wonder just how much their lives are bound up with the Quileute.

Before Edward, everything I knew about love I learned from my parents. They taught me - without ever saying a word - that love is a thing to be feared, and should it falter and fail, loneliness and solitude are all that remains.

And they've taught me too, just as Edward has, that love can be measured by how much we're willing to sacrifice. The years my parents spent apart, and the torture Edward endures just to be near me, all the things they've given up for a chance at love.

I feel as though the strength of my love for all of them is about to be tested, and I wonder if I'll be found wanting.

I shiver in the cooling air, knowing that Esme was right about one thing.

I am afraid.

I'm afraid of telling my mother and father about Edward and I, about Alice's vision, and all that it means. I'm afraid for Jake and Billy and Harry, and I'm paralysed with dread at the thought of taking a life, and losing mine before I'm ready.

But Esme's words have somehow given me courage, and the one thing I'm determined to no longer be afraid of is Edward.

Tonight my room feels like a cocoon, and I welcome Edward into it, drawing the curtains behind him and shutting out the noise of the day.

The sun and the wind and the wheeling thoughts have left me feeling slow and sleepy, and Edward sits on the bed where I lay, warm and settled. He bends, kissing my lips and my throat, running a cool finger over my cheek.

"You've been in the sun today, Bella," he says. "Your cheeks are the prettiest pink." He smiles. "How was your visit with Esme?"

"It was fine," I say, smiling too. He waits, his eyes lit with curiosity, but I say no more.

"That's all you have to say about it?"

"I'm sure she told you what we talked about, and anyway, there's been too much talking today, Edward. Too much talking, and too much thinking. I don't want to talk tonight. I just want to be."

"Alright," he says, "we can do that."

He watches me for a moment, brushing my hair away from my face until it fans out on the pillow like a veil.

"Do you mind if I lie next to you?" he asks, and I try to hide my surprise. His eyes are colored somewhere between gold and black tonight, and there's a peace in them I haven't seen before. I move over a little, making room for him, shy and smiling as we arrange ourselves on my narrow bed.

"You're feeling stronger," I say, resting on my side as he stretches out on his back.

"Sometimes," he replies. "Sometimes not."

The drowsiness vanishes, driven away by the thrill of having him so calm, and so close to me. He stares at the ceiling, quiet and still, not quite touching me.

"Edward," I say, "do you sleep?"

"No," he replies. "Never. I miss it." He lifts my wrist to his lips, and breathing deeply, kisses it gently. "This feels close, though. You can't imagine how peaceful it is for me to be with you like this."

His eyes drift closed, and I take this rare opportunity to look at him, _really _look at him. His hair catches the light on my nightstand like strands of golden red silk caught in the sunshine, and his lips are as full and lush as a peach on a summer's day. The shallow arc of his dark brows, the proud line of his nose, the sharp line of his jaw, all the peaks and troughs of a face that I cannot imagine ever growing tired of.

He is altogether a beautiful thing, wild in his impulses and noble in his will to control them. I want to run my fingers over his lips, and whisper in his ear, tired of holding back.

I close my eyes briefly, letting thoughts and feelings long suppressed flood my mind and warm my body, and when I open them again, Edward is watching me through half lidded eyes.

"What are you thinking about?"

"Us," I say.

"What about us?"

I open my mouth to tell some little white lie, but it's no good. A cocoon is a fragile thing, not meant to be lived in for long, and the world intrudes.

"I'm thinking that time is running out for us in ways I hadn't counted on," I say, "and how strange a thing that is when eternity is the alternative. And I'm thinking that I want you, and that I don't have the luxury of being patient anymore."

"Such sad things to think about, Bella," he says. "Such sad and dangerous things."

"Maybe," I say, "but some things are worth the risk. There's not many ways I can share my love with you, not many experiences we can have together, Edward, not in this room, and not with the clock ticking. I don't want to wait anymore for the things we can have together."

He pulls himself away and rises from the bed, walking slowly across the room until he's leaning next to the window. His eyes are black now, as I knew they would be, but his fists hang loose at his sides.

"Are you going to stay over there for long?" I ask.

"Give me a minute, please," he says.

"A minute," I say. "It seems like such a small thing to ask for, doesn't it? Just a minute. Just a little bit of time."

"Bella," he says, "what is this about?"

I sit up, and raise my chin.

I will not be afraid.

"Time," I say. "It's about time. It's running out for us, isn't it, Edward?"

His face darkens, a black scowl that I want to turn from.

But I don't.

I take a deep breath and hold it for a long moment, and take another step on this long road from ignorance to knowledge.

"Do you know where the meadow is?"

"Yes," he says. His mouth is set in a firm line, but I wait him out. Eventually he shakes his head a little, a gesture of defeat, and sighs heavily. "I've been there," he says. "It's not far from here, Bella, in the forest."

"You said there were flowers."

"Yes."

"So, it's spring," I say, "or summer."

He nods, his eyes tight, and I walk to the window, close to him. The glass feels cold beneath my fingers, but the stars are clear in the cloudless sky. I touch my cool fingers to the skin on my cheeks, warm and pink from my afternoon at First Beach.

A Forks summer may not come with the same sting as summer in Phoenix, but still there's no denying it. The seasons are turning, and summer will soon be here.

I turn to Edward, watching him closely. "How do I look in Alice's vision?"

"You're smiling, Bella. You look happy and content, lying in my arms, relaxed and easy."

"No," I say. "That's not what I meant. How soon does it happen, Edward? How _old_ do I look? You've seen it in Alice's mind. You know. How old? Twenty? Thirty? Forty?" I ask, my voice small. "Seventeen?"

"You look just the same as you do now." He swallows. "You look seventeen."

I nod, expecting this answer.

"Harry Clearwater will die soon," I say, "and when he does, the Quileute won't be bound by him anymore. Billy will be the new Chief, won't he?"

He nods again.

"They'll tell Charlie about us, won't they? If we don't tell them first, Jake and Billy will tell Renee and Charlie all about us."

"Bella, I'm so sorry," he says. "I wanted to tell you. I've nearly told you so many times, but I see how you struggle with your decision. You have so much pressure on you already. I hoped, God, how I've hoped that you'd come to a decision soon, before it came to that."

"But it's not just that, is it?"

"No," he says, "it's not just that."

"There's something about my blood, isn't there? My blood, and my father's blood? We heal or protect the Quileute in some way, don't we?"

"No, Bella," he says, clutching my arms. "No, it's not that. It's not exactly that, anyway."

"But it's something like that, isn't it? It's something that only our blood can do."

He doesn't reply. He just stares at me like I'm something he doesn't recognize, like I'm something that can hurt him more thoroughly and more completely than anything else ever has.

I raise my arm, and place my trembling hand over his heart, dizzy and barely breathing.

"No heartbeat," I murmur. "No blood."

"No," he says quietly, the pain in his eyes so intense I can barely stand to look at him. "No, Bella. No blood."

~~~ O ~~~

Thanks so much for reading xx


	16. Chapter 16

Thanks always to Liz, Alby & Annette. I can't help tweaking after they're done, so any mistakes are mine.

Disclaimer: Stephenie Myer owns it all.

~~~ Charlie ~~~

Billy's proud profile is just visible in the soft glow of the dashboard lights as we make our way back from First Beach. It's such a familiar place to be; Billy and me winding our way through the night with the hum of the road beneath us and the trees whipping by our windows.

It's late, but when we pull up at Harry's house the porch light is still on and a chink of light escapes between the drapes. We sit for a moment, Billy squinting into the darkness, rubbing his thumb along the steering wheel while his truck idles roughly beneath us. I massage my good arm, trying to ease the aching muscles.

I've been to enough Quileute burials over the years to know exactly what to expect, but this one was harder than most. Physically, it hurt. The long row from the shore to A-Ka-Lat with just one good arm to pull through the waves set my muscles burning, and I had to use my injured arm towards the end. I'm worried I've opened the wound up, but there's no way of telling in this light.

Billy looks toward the house. "It's the first time I've ever been out there without him," he says.

"Me too," I reply.

It was strange to stand on James Island without Harry, as though we were doing something wrong, and he might appear any moment and take over from Billy. That's impossible now though. He's too frail to make the crossing from First Beach to James Island. Even standing on the beach to see Old Quil off on his final journey, leaning heavily on Sue's arm, seemed too much for Harry, and he was gone when we returned.

It must have been hard for him and Sue to watch as we pushed the canoes into the water, the hulls grating against the sand before being carried away on the waves, knowing he'll be next.

Harry's porch has settled low on the ground over the years, as if the constant stream of Quileute bounding up the steps has driven it slowly into the earth. This house used to be a place of such high energy and even higher spirits. There were always people coming and going with food, and kids kicking balls in the yard, craning their necks with envy and pride as the warriors emerged from the forest, back from patrols or from the meadow.

Harry was always at the center of it all, the sun around which we all revolved, issuing orders and bellowing instructions while the old widows stitched and chatted on the porch. Somehow he made them all feel like it was a game, just one big adventure, but I never saw it that way. I'd sit apart in the kitchen with Sue, flexing my fist while she drew the blood from my veins, and trying to stop my legs from shaking.

Some things don't change. My legs are trembling now, and the pulse in my throat leaps and hammers. I'm about to take my first tentative steps off a path that was carved out for me long ago. I think of my father and my grandfather, buried out there with the Quileute on that rock in the water, and wonder if they'd back me up, or if they'd turn away from me. I close my eyes briefly, trying to center myself, to regain my focus.

"Come on, Billy," I say. "Let's go."

He turns the ignition off, and looks at me long and hard.

"I don't know what you have in mind, Charlie, but be careful, OK? For all our sakes."

There's no way I can risk telling him what my plans are. I've stayed out of Quileute politics for years, but I know enough to have no doubt that Billy will be made chief when Harry is gone. Still, there can be no question marks over Billy's loyalty to his tribe. He's taken great risks with his cryptic warnings to me. When he figures out what I'm going to do – if he hasn't already – he'll know better than me whether getting involved will jeopardize his position.

I understand that, and I'm willing to go it alone if need be.

My mother always said that drunks speak the truth, and maybe that's true, but I've seen enough of them in my line of work to know that if they do, it's a distorted, ugly version of the truth. If my truth has become attacking my best friend and demanding secrets that I know aren't his to tell, then it's time to seek a better one.

There are so many reasons to be brave, so many reasons to do this.

"I'll be careful, Billy," I say.

The porch creaks in the quiet night, and so does the door as Sue opens it. She's in her robe, her long dark hair hanging straight and loose around her shoulders.

"How was it?" she asks.

Billy hugs her quickly, muttering something in her ear, and she nods shortly. It's late, after midnight, that time of day when the pleasantries demanded by the daylight hours no longer seem necessary. Pretense is gone, and Sue disappears without another word. Billy and I head for the dim light coming from the living room.

Harry looks even smaller hunched in his chair than he did at the beach, but his sharp eyes scan my face, missing nothing.

"Charlie," he says with a nod. "Billy." He leans back in the chair with a weary sigh. "So my old friend Quil is gone now."

"It went well, Chief," Billy says. "It was a hard crossing, but we got him there."

"Good," Harry says. "And you, Charlie? Your arm is healing?"

"It's fine, Harry, thanks," I say. "Look, it's late and we're all tired. I don't want to keep you. I have a request."

He grunts his permission, as though I'm a peasant come to beg a favor from the king. I take a moment, going over the words, thinking about Renee and how lately her demeanour reminds me of my mother.

There's not one good reason not to do this.

"Harry," I say, "Renee and I believe that there's something you aren't telling us, so I'm here tonight to ask you formally, as one who's been a part of this tribe as much as any white man can be, to share what you know."

I absorb his hard stare, being careful to keep my expression neutral. Challenging his authority won't get me anywhere, and anyway I have no expectation of hearing the truth. This isn't about that. It's not a question of collecting what I'm owed, of demanding payment for services rendered. This conversation is about giving him one last chance, even though I know he won't take it, to treat my family with the same respect that he'd treat his own people.

He leans forward in his chair, an ugly smirk twisting his lined face. "Stay out of Quileute business, Charlie. Go back to Forks. We'll call you if we need you."

I recoil at his words, each one hitting like a slap. I had not expected the truth, but nor had I expected this sneering dismissal. "I don't know what's happened to you, Harry," I say quietly.

"You don't know what's happened to me?" He gestures with a frail hand at himself, at the withered body, shrunken and broken, once so strong and now betraying him at every turn. "Don't you have eyes, Charlie?"

"I do," I say, "and I can't believe what I'm seeing with them."

He waves me out of the room. "Go away, Charlie. Go back to that wife of yours and leave my people to me."

Billy drives me back to his place. We don't say a word, but I can almost hear the gears clicking over in Billy's head as the headlights lead us on through the night. I climb into my car, fatigue settling deep in my bones. Winding the window down, I look beyond the moonlit woods to the blinking stars above.

Billy leans into my car a little, his forearm resting on the door.

"He can't even phase anymore," Billy says. "He can't accept what's happening to him."

"I've never seen it take anyone like that before," I say.

I waver, and almost falter, under the injustice of what happens to these people, to Quil and to Harry.

But I don't fall.

My family have paid a price too. Harry can watch out for his own people. It's time for me to look after mine.

"Billy," I say, "who's organizing the patrols these days?"

"That'd be me," he says.

"And who's guarding the store in Port Angeles tomorrow?"

Even in the darkness, the glint in Billy's eyes is unmistakeable. "Well now, let me think. I guess that'd be me and Jake," he says, rubbing his chin. "Yeah, I think me and Jake will watch the store tomorrow."

~ O ~

Renee peels the dressing from my arm with a touch so light it barely hurts at all, but her lips are pursed tight and she will not meet my eyes. The overhead light casts a cold circle over the kitchen table where we sit, bleary eyed in the dense quiet particular to these small hours after midnight. My face is tight and dry from my night on the water, and my lips taste of salt when I lick them. All I want to do is sleep.

"How does it look?" I ask.

"It looks fine," Renee says with that sewn up mouth, so unlike her that she even sounds different. "I still can't believe you went."

"I couldn't not go, Renee. I've known Quil all my life."

She sighs. "That's not what I meant."

"Jake is safe, you know that. Don't punish him for one mistake."

She looks pointedly at the lines running up my arm. "Safe, Charlie? Really?"

"Come on," I say, "it wasn't really his fault. It was stupid of me to drink so much, stupid of me to pick a fight with Billy. He's young and hot headed, acting on instinct. I was standing too close, that's all."

She takes a wad of cotton wool, squirts brown liquid onto it, and dabs at my arm. We've had this conversation a dozen times since my birthday, but we never get anywhere with it. I look down at my arm. The stitches are out, and it's healing fast.

"It's like someone getting shot while cleaning a gun," I say, unable to stop trying to make her see things differently. "It's the responsibility of the person cleaning the gun to empty the barrel. You can't blame the gun."

"It's not the same thing at all, Charlie, and you know it." The pressure of her touch on my arm is gentle, but her voice is not. She sits back for a moment, frustrated, the brown liquid dripping from the cotton held tight between her fingers. "He could have killed you, Charlie."

"But he didn't."

"This is impossible," she mutters. She puts the wad of cotton down on the table, not caring that it's staining the wood, and begins cutting long strips of white dressing with sharp, vicious strokes. "I've been running around this town all this time pretending nothing's wrong, living in some stupid land of make believe hoping if I ignore it all hard enough, it'll all just disappear." She puts the scissors down, shaking her head. "Jesus, Charlie, the people who are supposed to protect you are more dangerous than the vampires."

"You've never met a real vampire, Renee," I snap. "Besides, Jake never meant to hurt me."

"Well, he did."

A silence falls, heavy and more complete than any I've ever known between us. She finishes dressing my arm, and when she's done, she gathers up the bandages and scissors and throws them in a plastic box which she shoves on top of the fridge. She goes to the sink to wash her hands, her shoulders high and tight, as she stands with her back to me.

Insects click and hum outside, and the walls creak and settle around us. The night is humid, too close and too warm for the time of year, and dew gathers on the windows. My arm throbs in time with the noises of the forest.

Renee turns to face me, twisting the dish cloth in slow endless circles around her hands. She raises her chin, and speaks slowly and clearly, as though she wants to be sure I hear her right, as though she wants to make sure that I cannot possibly mistake her meaning.

"I think I'm going to have to tell Bella," she says. "I know you won't agree, and I don't know what that will do to us – to you and me - but I can't let things stand anymore. She has to know, Charlie. She has to know so she can take measures, so she can protect herself."

"I see," I say, my voice low and measured, matching hers. "How?"

"How am I going to tell her?

"No, how exactly will she protect herself?"

Her eyes flick to my arm, and she shrugs, a gesture of defeat and hopelessness.

"We're involved in a world we have no business being in," I say. "We are human, Renee, nothing more than that. Just defenceless human beings caught up in a supernatural world. Please explain to me what good it will do to tell her."

"I don't know, Charlie. I don't know. I just know we have to do _something_."

She's crying now, bitter tears of rage and fear, and I go to her, trying to hold her even as she pushes me away. I hold my ground though, and she clutches at me, hard fingers gripping like claws at my skin and my hair. I take the hits, trying to absorb her pain, trying to draw it out of her like poison from a wound. Sounds fall from my lips, soothing noises, as though I'm trying to tame something wild, and after a time – a long time - she settles and stills, and falls against me, limp and spent.

"I worried about you every minute I was in Phoenix, Charlie," she whispers, curled into my shoulder like a child. "Every single minute of every day, always wondering if you were out there in that forest again, jumping every time the phone rang in case it was Billy's voice on the other end of the line. I felt like a war bride waiting on a telegram, but this, Charlie? This is different. It's right here, all of it, all of them, all the time. There's no escape from it, no pretending it's not real anymore." She shudders lightly against me. "I don't know how you've stood it all these years."

I stroke her hair and hold her tight. "But don't you see, Renee? You tell her about it all, and that's what she'll have to live with too. We can protect her from that. Why wouldn't we protect her from that, Renee?"

She shakes her head against my shoulder, her hair running silken through my fingers.

"It's hopeless," she whispers. "Absolutely, completely hopeless."

Over her shoulder and through the window, the woods glow in the moonlight. My memories of Jake and Billy on my birthday are little more than a series of tattered fragments, snatches of phrases and feelings that I can't pin down. All except one moment; a moment that stands apart, crisp and clear, and impossible to mistake for anything but the truth.

Right before I passed out on the forest floor at Jake and Billy's feet, I looked up.

_She_ always comes from there, swooping down from the trees screaming for my blood, wailing my name.

I looked for _her_.

There was a coven of vampires living somewhere close by in the very forest where I stood bleeding, breathing the same air as me, but in that moment, acting on instinct alone, I didn't look for them.

_I looked for her._

When I woke to find Carlisle Cullen stitching my arm, I was afraid, but I question now whether that sharp spike of fear was real or manufactured. I've spent time with him. Not much, but enough. Half a dozen times I've stood across from him and Edward Cullen in the meadow while different members of his family were paraded before me, one after the other.

I've lain on a hospital bed with my blood dripping through his fingers.

Maybe the incessant beeping of that heart monitor was nothing more than shock, driven higher by a Pavlovian response, a fabricated reaction to a deeply ingrained trigger. Was I afraid of him because I've been conditioned to be, or because I really _was_?

He's never given me a single reason to think that he's a danger to me.

I flex the fist on my injured arm.

The only thing worse than no hope at all is false hope, so I've waited to be sure before sharing any of this with Renee. I don't know that I've ever kept anything from her before, and the weight of my thoughtful silence has driven more of wedge between us than all the power and might of the Quileute and the Cullens combined could ever do.

I take her face in my hands, and kiss her, and hold her steady in my arms.

I believe there might be a way out of this.

It's time to tell her everything.

~~~ O ~~~

She looks so worn and defeated that I almost decide to let her sleep tonight, but she needs to hear this, and now. I lived without hope for long enough to know what it does to a person. I lead her back to the table like I'm leading a small child, and she sits, red-eyed and bewildered. I put some coffee on, and she stares at the floor, lost in herself.

"Renee," I say, "I have something to tell you."

She raises her head, looking at me like I'm someone she can't quite place, a stranger who's appeared in her kitchen speaking a language she doesn't understand.

I clear my throat. "A few things, in fact. The first is that I spoke to Harry tonight. I asked him flat out to tell us what the Quileute are hiding from us."

"No doubt he wouldn't tell you," she says, the words spat out on a note of heartbreaking bitterness that falls from her lips like a note played off key. I put my hand on hers, rubbing my thumb over her smooth skin, wanting her – the _essence_ of her – back so badly.

"No, he wouldn't."

She shrugs, and shakes her head. "No surprises there."

"No," I say. "No surprises but, Renee, I think I've figured it out anyway."

Her brown eyes widen, and she leans in closer.

And there it is, finally.

The hard lines on her face soften and the familiar look in her eyes returns, that fierce light driven by her unyielding determination to fight for our family. It's the greater part of her, the part I love the best, and whether we're living under the same roof or thousands of miles apart, it feeds me and gives me strength like nothing else can.

I took it away from her that night in the forest, and now I'm giving it back.

"Listen, Renee, I think we've been looking at this all wrong," I say. "We assumed Harry hadn't told us about the red one coming back so we'd think it was safe to bring Bella back to Forks, right?

She nods.

"I think there's more to it than that. Look, you know how it went with her. She killed Harry's brother, she killed my father, and she nearly got me too, right? Then the other vampires stop coming, all except her."

She shakes her head. "Yes, and?"

"Renee, if there's one vampire in all existence that Harry wants killed, it's her. When she first came back, why didn't he call me in?"

"Because he didn't want us to know she was back. Because he needed her around to trigger the phase."

"But, Renee, he didn't know in the beginning that the others wouldn't come back too. He couldn't have known he'd need to keep her around. I think there's another reason."

I sit for a moment, watching as she mulls this all over. "What do you think it means."

"Think about it, Renee. She killed Harry's brother and she killed my father, and she got away. She came back for me, and nearly killed me too, and she got away _again_. Then she came back all the other times that Harry didn't tell us about, and every time, she got away. She's the only one to ever leave the meadow alive, and she's done it not once or twice but many, many times."

"I think Harry's theory is that she can't be caught, that she has some kind of ability, some gift of evasion. I think that's why he didn't call me in to try and kill her. Because if we worked out that she couldn't be caught, we'd never allow Bella back."

"But, Charlie, that's not good news."

"No, it's not," I say, "but I think there's something we can do about it. Listen up, Renee, I have a plan."

~~~O~~~

Renee drives, leaning into the steering wheel as if to urge her old car a little faster down the 101. We've had no sleep at all, but she looks as wide awake and energized as I feel. It's as though the narrow world I've inhabited for so long has split open a little, and I'm peering into something previously unseen, barely even thought of. It's a broader slice of the sliver of light I saw in the hospital that night when Carlisle stitched my arm up, a more open space filled with fresh air and the promise of something good, something better, if only we're brave enough to try.

We talked all night, and just before dawn, Renee handed me the phone, and I made the call.

Renee knows the way, and she parks near the small store in the quiet Port Angeles morning. She offers me a weak smile and her hand as we stand together on the sidewalk, swaying gently together with nerves and fatigue. Across the street, Billy and Jake watch from the shadows, Jake whistling tunelessly as he looks casually down the street. Billy stares at Renee, and I shrug. In the end, I didn't really try that hard to talk her out of coming.

"If it isn't safe for me, Charlie, then it sure as hell isn't safe for you."

We saw Bella off to school, and Renee grabbed her keys and, with a pointed look at me, got in the driver's seat. It wasn't in me to try and stop her. If I believe in what I'm doing, then I have to believe it all the way.

Bells ring as we enter the store. I have a vague impression of sweet smells and objects crowded around me, but my eyes lock on _them_ and nowhere else.

Three figures, pale as ghosts, waiting.

I hear Renee's sharp intake of breath, and she holds my hand a little tighter.

"Alright?" I ask, and she nods shortly.

Esme Cullen smiles at us, and I try to smile back.

I've only seen her once before. During the meetings in the meadow when the Cullens first came, my condition was that there were never more than three of them at a time. Carlisle and Edward were always there, along with whoever I was meeting that day. I was curious for a long time as to why. Carlisle Cullen is clearly their leader, and I understood why he was there, but why Edward? He never said a lot, never did much but listen. At first I thought maybe they did it to torment me, to draw the process out, to watch me squirm, but now I believe there was a different reason for his presence.

"Charlie," Carlisle says. "How's your arm?"

"Healing fast," I reply.

"Good," he says. He hesitates, not quite smiling.

The bells ring quietly at my back. With a quick glance over my shoulder, I see Jake and Billy standing just inside the door, arms folded and waiting.

I clear my throat, watching Edward Cullen closely. "I have something to ask you, something I hope you'll at least consider. A favor, I guess."

"What is it that you want, Charlie?" Carlisle asks.

I don't answer though. Instead I flood my mind with all the evidence I have, all the things the Cullens have somehow, without logical explanation, known. My conversation with Carlisle that night in the hospital, their knowledge of Bella's blood, how they even knew to contact the Quileute when they first came near Forks.

My eyes don't stray from Edward's face. He looks guilty, bashful almost, and smiles ruefully. His eyes lock on mine, and I smile hesitantly back.

"Why don't you ask Edward," I say. "He can tell you."

~~~ O ~~~

"So, you've guessed," Edward says. "I wondered if you would."

It's a strange thing, to stand before someone who can read not just my mind, but the thoughts of everyone here. Renee grips my hand tighter, and Edward's eyes flicker to hers. I regret suddenly not fighting harder for her to stay at home. The notion of him invading my wife's mind, of him having access to thoughts that she doesn't even share with me, is beyond repellent.

"Concentrate on why we're here," I whisper to her, feeling ridiculous for even trying to keep my words private.

"Oh, I am," Renee replies. She's just about bouncing on the spot, squeezing my hand so hard it hurts in the same way that smiling too much hurts. "Charlie, this could work."

"What could work?" Esme Cullen is smiling too, her head turned towards Edward but her eyes on us.

"Charlie," Edward says, "I'll let you explain."

_This is it._

_Oh God, please._

"There's a vampire who hunts here," I say. "She's been here many times and, other than your family, is the only one who's ever left the meadow alive." I take a deep breath, and look away from Edward Cullen's eyes. "She killed Harry Clearwater's brother many years ago, and she killed my father, too. She's been back since then, many times. We believe she's coming back for me. We believe that having tasted…" Suddenly the words dry up, and I find I can't finish the sentence.

Edward Cullen raises a questioning eyebrow, and I nod. "Having tasted Charlie's father," he says, speaking for me, "they feel sure that she's coming back for Charlie's blood, and that it's only a matter of time before she's successful."

"I think she has a gift," I continue, "like Edward. I think that maybe she _can't_ be caught."

"I see," Carlisle says. "Well, it's certainly possible. Many of our kind have gifts. What is it you propose?"

"We hoped you'd try and track her down for us. We thought maybe Edward could get a look inside her mind, see if she's thinking about coming back. Maybe pick up some clues on how we could catch her if she does come back. She poses a huge threat to me and my daughter, and by extension to everyone in Forks and La Push."

"Please," Renee says, looking at Esme Cullen, "please consider it. She'll come for my husband again, I know she will." Her voice drops, and a look passes between my wife and Esme Cullen, something fierce and primal and feminine. "Please help us."

Edward and Carlisle exchange a look. "I want you to know that we run patrols of our own," Edward says. "We range further from Forks than the Quileute, and we've seen no sign of this vampire. Please be assured that we wouldn't allow her to get close to you if we did."

"Well," I say, "that's certainly a comfort to know. Still, I'd be grateful if you'd consider our request. I don't expect your family will be in Forks forever. She'll come back, and I want to be ready for her when she does."

Again, a significant look passes between Edward and Carlisle. I wonder what Carlisle Cullen is thinking, and why he seems to be deferring to Edward.

_Please do it. Please say yes. Please help me protect my daughter._

_Please please please please please…_

"We'll do it," Edward Cullen says firmly.

"When?" Renee asks.

"Soon," he says. "You have my word on that, if it's worth anything to you. We won't go immediately, but I promise you that we will do this for you."

~~~ O ~~~

Bella and I drive out of Forks, the sunlight flickering like strobe lights between the shadows. Bella drives slowly and carefully in the hazy drizzle, and I rest my head against the cool window. My body is aching for sleep, my head screaming for it, but there's one more thing to be done before this long day can end.

We don't say much as Bella's truck rumbles down the narrow road out of town, and I don't mind. It's enough for me just to be in this space with her, discovering just as much about her by her silence as if she was talking all the way. I find that my daughter is a restful person to be with. The frenetic days with her in Phoenix, trying to pack a year's worth of living into a few days, and the haze of guilt that hung over everything, made it difficult to see anything clearly. Our time together in Forks hasn't been much different.

I study her now. Her dark brown eyes, tired lately, are her mother's shape and my color. Her long hair and narrow build are her mother's too. There is so much more of Renee in her than me, just as I'd always hoped, but still she seems unfamiliar. I don't really know her.

We turn off the main road, bouncing over muddy potholes until we reach the parking lot. Bella carefully gathers up the bundle of flowers that lie on the seat between us. She knew without asking which flowers my mother liked best, and insisted on paying for them herself. The white lisianthus are wrapped in pale pink paper, and it crackles softly as we walk shoulder to shoulder up the gentle slope and through the misty rain.

The need to come here after a Quileute burial is always strong. It's as though by being here I am somehow strengthening the thread, worn thin by the passing years, that stretches from this muddy hillside all the way across the ocean to James Island. When my mother got sick, she begged Harry to allow her to be buried with my father on that island, but he refused to break with Quileute tradition for her.

Maybe the signs were there all along, and I was too blind to see them.

I lead Bella to my mother's grave, the hard edges of the cold white stone softened over time by the black moss and the endless, relentless rain. Bella stands beside me, her head bowed, and I let my mind go, let the thoughts flow without restraint or censorship, wishing my mother could hear them.

_I'm still here, ma, but I'm not alone anymore. I have someone here with me. It's Bella. Bella's here with me, and Renee's here in Forks now too. We're together, the three of us, just like you always hoped we'd be._

_There's still trouble but I'm fighting hard. I'm trying so hard to find a way._

I raise my head for a moment. Grey clouds scud across the afternoon sky, heavy with rain and ready to burst, and a cold wind whips up the hill, stirring the grass at our feet and the flowers in Bella's arms. Her lips move, perhaps in a silent prayer, and she kneels slowly to the long grass and places the flowers there, kissing them briefly before she does.

_God, I wish you could see our girl. She's growing up so fast, seventeen now. I didn't ask her to come here today. I didn't have to. She hasn't forgotten you. She's grown up just like you would have wanted._

Bella wipes a tear away, and slips her hand into mine.

"I wish I'd known her better, Dad," she says.

My throat closes over at her touch and at that word, but I find my voice somehow. "I wish you had, too, Bella," I say, "and I'll bet she does too."

_I promised I'd try, I promised I'd fight for her._

_Our girl knows nothing, ma, just like I promised you._

Bella and I turn together on some unspoken signal, heads down and leaning into the wind, as the rain picks up, hard drops like pin pricks on our skin. It's only when we get back to her truck that Bella releases my hand.

The Quileute were my surrogate family for so long, but I don't feel anymore that I belong with them. But more than that, I don't feel that I belong _to_ them anymore.

Before my grandfather's time, people disappeared not only from the forest, but from their beds in the town. That all changed when the magic of our blood was discovered. I've spent far too long feeling beholden to the Quileute, not just for protecting me in the forest, but for protecting the people of Forks, the same people I'm sworn to keep safe.

Harry Clearwater told me in that first conversation after my father died that the Quileute needed me, but somewhere along the way, worn down by the passing of so many lonely years, I lost sight of that fact. The balance of power swung imperceptibly in Harry's favor and, desperate and vulnerable, I allowed it to happen.

Bella and I drive slowly home in a warm, close silence. The ties that bind us, the threads that wind and weave from me to her, and to Renee and to my mother and father, are stronger than I ever realized. Even though Bella has released my hand, I still feel tethered to her. I ride the moment like it's a wave bringing me home, taking me exactly where I need to be.

~ O ~

Thanks so much for reading xx


	17. Chapter 17

The usual heartfelt thanks to Liz, Alby and Annette for spending their time with this chapter.

Disclaimer: Ms Meyer owns everything.

So, a long time between drinks. I apologise – I promise it's not for want of trying! Thanks so much for reading.

~ Bella ~

My mother and father stand together in the yard, bathed in a halo of mellow afternoon sunlight. Renee is curved into Charlie's shoulder like she was made to fit there, and she smiles up at him, easy and free. From where I watch at the kitchen window, with the light falling golden on their faces, they seem like romantic figures from another time. Edward told me that my father has a great capacity to love, and looking at Charlie now, it's easy to believe.

Sam Uley is out there with them, pacing out lines with wide strides on the grass, measuring and talking nonstop. He's here to finish my mother's abandoned studio, and she is overjoyed. My father, too, seems happier than he has since that terrible visit to La Push when the Cullens first came. The signs are there if you know what to look for.

Yesterday he dragged the fishing rod I gave him for his birthday down from the attic where it had been shoved it out of sight. He didn't do anything much with it but take it to the back porch and sit with it across his knees for a while, gazing wistfully at the forest. I'm sure he was dreaming of all the fat silver fish just waiting in the green river that winds through the woods. When he came back inside, he didn't put the rod back in the attic. Instead he left it leaning against the wall in the laundry room as though maybe he intends using it one day soon.

Sam says something, and my parents laugh. Charlie glances at his watch, says something to my mother, and looks toward the house. When he sees me standing at the kitchen window, he smiles.

I wave to him, and as I raise my hand the light catches on the ring on my index finger, the moonstone that's set on the silver band glowing pearly white like it's lit from within. Edward left the ring for me in my truck today. Yesterday he left a pair of silver earrings. They're pretty, and I love them, but every time I felt those earrings brush against my neck today a prickle of unease ran over my skin.

Edward has never left gifts like this for me before. His presents have always been little scraps of things; sketches he's drawn or found things from the woods, things that had no value until he gave them to me.

When I sit in class fighting to stay awake, I think of him roaming the forest searching for a treasure, or sitting on a rock drawing a bird or a leaf or me. Edward standing in a store in Port Angeles picking out jewellery doesn't seem much like him at all, and I wonder if it's Esme who bought the earrings and the ring for me.

Maybe there's nothing in it. Maybe she just saw them, and thought I'd like them. Maybe he did. But I can't stop the shiver from crawling up my spine as I turn my hand this way and that, watching the stone change from luminous white to mottled grey to flat silver in the sunlight. If there's some grand implication behind it all, I have no idea what it is and no energy left to be curious. There's no space left in my head to wonder at the meaning of one more thing.

Sam, Renee and Charlie invade the kitchen. Renee sits at the table with Sam, and they pass a pen back and forth as they add to a diagram of her studio. Charlie puts the coffee on and gets some snacks from the fridge.

"How was school?" he asks. "You're late."

I'm late because I was walking in the woods after school. After I'd slipped the moonstone ring on my finger, I felt drawn to the forest as though pulled by an invisible thread. I wandered under the giant trees, weaving between the vast black trunks and kicking at the ferns that batted at my legs on a lonely, fruitless search. I strayed far from the safety of the tree line near school, eyes narrowed like a hunter, hoping to see a pale face in the shadows.

I have long thought that he watches me when I'm at school. I've invented a routine for him to account for the hours of daylight. Maybe he hunts when he leaves me, needing to extinguish his thirst after a night in my room. I know he goes running, and I picture him roaming free through the trees in search of a gift for me. I imagine him waiting as the sun gets higher in the sky. Waiting, and watching, immobile under the green canopy as the leaves make a pattern of diamonds and lace on his skin, while I weave my way through the quad between classes.

But he wasn't there.

Charlie is laying cookies out on a plate, and getting cups and spoons from the drawer. I recall the last time I was late, the day I sat alone on the sports field whispering Edward's name, calling him to me. The questions when I got home, the concern, the lies. But Charlie's not worried this time. He just seems happy I'm here, and unconcerned with where I've been.

Renee clutches Sam's forearm. "I can't believe this is finally happening. It makes my fingers itch to get in there. How long will it take to build?"

"Not long," he replies. "It's a simple structure. Maybe a week or so."

"Do you hear that?" she says, beaming at Charlie and me.

I feel like screaming at them both.

_Don't laugh._

_Don't be happy._

_It will only make it worse for you._

How can I tell them? How?

It's not just Edward. It's not just Alice's vision.

Whatever it is that our blood does, I will be taking it with me when I'm changed.

I will be ending the bloodline.

I don't eat the cookies, and I take my coffee upstairs to my room.

Everything seems impossible alone in the daylight, and the wait for the darkness feels endless.

~~~ O ~~~

I empty my school bag onto my desk, the books and binders I seldom open anymore falling over each other in an overwhelming pile of drudgery. Summer break will soon be here, and feigning interest in schoolwork I'll soon have no use for, gets harder with every passing day.

My intention of dividing my afternoons between sleep and homework to stay on top of my increasing fatigue and falling grades hasn't really worked. My scattered concentration and crowded head make both impossible, but I crack open a book and try to get some work done.

It's hopeless.

Completing an essay on mathematical theorem is impossible against the thudding reality of Harry Clearwater's impending death. He will die soon, and the Quileute will be released from the hold he has over their thoughts and actions. Billy will be free to act as he chooses, to say what he wants, and the first words out of his mouth will be to my father.

I have to tell Charlie and Renee before Harry Clearwater dies, before Billy tells them himself. It will be so much worse coming from someone else.

I have to tell them.

I try to picture it, fussing over the details in my mind. Will my parents and I sit at the kitchen table or stand in the living room? Daytime or night? With Edward there or without? Anything, _anything_, to avoid imagining the actual words.

And what if I do manage to get the words out? What then?

My bed with the purple quilt on top and the twinkle lights above sits against the orange wall where it always has. I see myself reclined on it, candles flickering shadows on the wall as Edward's ruby lips descend slowly to my throat. I feel his soft kiss, hear my ragged breathing and Edward's moan as the sting of teeth and burning venom take the place of his kisses.

Where will my mother and father be when this is going on, while I lie meekly in Edward's arms as he changes me forever? It's impossible to imagine them in some other part of the house, smiling benignly while their daughter is changed into a creature that will awaken with a murderous thirst, all traces of humanity gone.

But there is Alice's vision.

Somehow, it happens.

Whatever the circumstances, the outcome remains the same.

I startle at a thud on my door, knocking a book to the floor. It's Renee. She stands in the doorway twisting her hair into a bun which she ties in place with a black elastic.

"You're studying too hard, Bella," she says. "You look tired."

"I'm alright," I reply. "The work is a bit harder here than it was in Phoenix."

She isn't fooled for a second, but she is tentative, hesitant. "Well, I think it's more than schoolwork. Look Bella, I know things have been a bit rough for you since we got here. I know we've had our…. problems, but I feel like you're more understanding of me and your father now. Not so angry." She comes into the room a little further, glances around, and sits on the end of my bed. "I'm more grateful for that than I can say, but I still feel that something's bothering you. You're tired and distracted, not really yourself." She smoothes her palm over the quilt, the fabric rippling before her fingers. "I think you have a secret of your own."

Heat flashes up my face, and I turn from her to stand in Edward's old spot next to the window. My faded truck is parked out there in the drive, solid and reassuring. How wonderful it would be to just grab my keys and weave my way through the mountains until I found Edward. I rest my palm against the place on the wall where his chest would be, were he standing here with me.

I have a sudden moment of near hysteria, as a giggle rises in my throat and threatens to escape. She's as ignorant of my deceit as I was of hers, and the sheer ridiculousness of the whole situation threatens to overwhelm me. The three of us, all under the same roof, creeping and hiding while the puppet master Harry and the all knowing Edward watch us circle endlessly around each other. I press my fingernails into my palms until my eyes smart, and the moment passes.

"Is it a boy?" Renee asks.

I shrug, my hands playing in the folds of the drapes. Charlie told me she made them when she was pregnant, and I wonder why. Was there a chance that my blood wouldn't be like his, and he wouldn't have to send us away?

"Look, Bella, I understand if you want to keep him to yourself, but whoever he is, he doesn't seem to be making you very happy." I keep my back to her, staring at my truck. "If you ever want to talk, I'm a good listener, and I can probably offer better advice than your girlfriends can, that's all."

"I will, Mom, I promise." I pull the fabric to my face, pretend I'm rubbing the lemon scented softness against my cheek, hoping she won't notice the damp patch where the fabric is a little darker now. It's sadder somehow to tell her the truth than it is to tell her another lie. "Not yet, but soon."

She leaves quietly, and I push the window wide open and gulp in the warm fragrant air. Some kids down the street are playing ball, the thwack of wood on leather echoing like thunder through the twilight. The rain still comes and goes but the intervals between showers are longer now, and even under the soft northern sun, I can feel the woods awakening. The pungent scent of moss drying and green tendrils stirring through the earth quickens the blood, and the world feels ripe and ready to bloom.

I wait, unmoving at my window in the waning light, as the velvet veil of dusk approaches, so welcome and so necessary.

After dinner I turn the light off in the bathroom, and take a long hot shower. Billowing steam unfurls unseen in the darkness as the remains of the day are washed away under the cascading water. It's good to disappear for a time, for these few stolen minutes. I lock down the other compartments in my head, and knock down the walls where Edward is hidden. I set him free from my blood, and let him roam slowly over my body, to explore places untouched by anyone but me. It's easy to imagine it's his hands on me, warmed by the water and the heat from my skin, easy to imagine that he's here, hiding in the dark with me.

I search for, and find, those few mindless moments, but too soon the water runs cold and the trembling is over.

I'm right back where I began, with crowded thoughts to wade through, endless questions, and the waiting still to be endured.

~~~ O ~~~

Edward cuts through the darkness like a ray of light through my window. He kisses me, lips and throat and lips again, and then he looks at my finger. I whisper a thanks in his ear, giddy like a child, allowing myself the freedom to feel with abandon. His heady scent and cool mouth have done what I need them to. I lose myself in him like I'm diving into a cool, clear stream to escape the summer heat.

He sits in the rocking chair in the corner of my room, a drawing pad resting on his arm as he sketches. His hand moves slightly faster than a human hand would, and I'm enthralled as his golden eyes flicker from me to the page, and back again.

A hint of a smile plays at the corner of his mouth, and his fingers darken as he softens the sharp lines on the page. Those blackened hands make him seem more human somehow, and the way his finger smudges the paper, sometimes in long sweeping curves and sometimes in fast short strokes, makes my breath come a little faster.

"Why don't you ever come before they're asleep?" I ask. "It's so hard waiting for you."

"I don't know." He shrugs. "It's just a line I'm not willing to cross."

"What line is that?"

"While they're sleeping I can't hear their thoughts. I get scraps from their dreams, but I try really hard to stay out of their heads when I'm here. I don't always succeed, but I try."

Something happens in my chest, a feeling of swelling fullness, as though a flower, too long tightly budded, is opening into full bloom. He tries so hard. In the midst of this madness where not much we do is right, he still tries so hard to keep the twisted scraps of his moral compass pointing toward true north.

"There aren't many ways we can treat them well just now, are there?"

"There's only one way I can think of," he says.

"I know," I reply. "We have to tell them soon, don't we?"

He nods. "Yes," he says. "We do."

"It's so strange to be around them now, knowing that they _know_. I think back to what I accused my father of, the things I said to my mother, and all I feel is shame."

"Shame, Bella? Why shame? You reacted naturally. You couldn't have known – you still don't really know – why they acted as they did."

"Shame because I'm stripping them of the same dignity they took from me, and because I trusted you, Edward, more than I ever trusted them."

What I'm doing to them is really no worse than what they did to me. That's what I tell myself anyway. It seems to be the curse of the Swan family, more than whatever it is our blood does. Barely an honest word passes between us. All my life it's been like that and I never knew. This is what we are, it seems, this is what we do. Maybe if we had a family crest - a gag and a blindfold perhaps, a closed door and a turned back - I'd feel like I was operating with cause, helpless under our standard, and we'd have known what to expect from each other.

But I'm not brave enough to speak the truth just yet, and so the charade goes on. They're protecting me and I'm protecting them, and none of this is right.

The only thing that gives me hope is the same thing that takes it away. It all comes back to Alice's vision. If I'm lying in the meadow, happy and at ease, somehow my parents must give me their blessing. It's just impossible to imagine why.

Edward is watching me closely, wishing perhaps that he could hear my thoughts. We have been over this time and time again, and I'm tired of the pointless repetition of a conversation that can take us nowhere.

I cast around for a diversion, something new and different to talk about.

"Dad and I visited my grandmother's grave this week," I say.

"Do you do that often?"

"No, I'd never been before. It was sad. She died when I was in Phoenix. We wrote each other and we met once, but I didn't really know her that well."

Why do I still find her so hard to talk about? This is not a good subject. A stupid idea. I try to calm myself, but it's too late for that. Edward's sharp eyes miss nothing.

His hand stills, hovering above the page, grave eyes searching my face. "What is it, Bella?"

"Oh, I don't know. Just… this might sound stupid, but I felt like I was saying goodbye to her."

"Well, that's natural if you hadn't been to her graveside before."

"No, that's not what I mean." I pick at a purple flower on my quilt, just as Renee did earlier, pleating the petals between my fingers until they disappear. "I mean that I always felt like I'd see her again, even after she died, you know? That one day I'd go wherever she's gone, and we'd be together." I shrug. "My idea of heaven, I guess. But now, well, Alice's vision means that even the dream of that is gone."

"I see," he says carefully, eyes fixed on the sketchbook.

"I know it hurts you to hear that, Edward, but I don't want to hide anything from you. It's how I felt, that's all, and I don't want to pretend things are OK when they're not."

"I would never want you to do that, Bella."

"I just… I just can't see how this comes out right, Edward. I can't see how we get to the meadow. I want to be there with you, I want to be with you forever, I just can't see how it happens."

His hand pauses mid stroke, suspended above the paper. "What did you say?"

"I can't see how this comes out right."

"No," he says, his eyes darkening. "Not that."

Not that.

I'm not good with the words, and I don't give him gifts but somehow I thought he would know.

"I've never really told you, have I?" He shakes his head, serious eyes watching my every move. "I would want to be with you forever, even without Alice's vision. Surely you must know that."

"No," he says. "I didn't know that."

His face splits into the most beautiful smile, his dark eyes bright as though they are lit by the sun.

He's beaming.

He looks _happy_.

And I made him feel it.

I hug my knees, and grin back, high on him and lost in the moment.

The smile slowly fades from his mouth, but it stays there in his eyes. He puts the sketchbook carefully on the floor. I catch a glimpse of two hands on the white page, twisted around each other, as mine so often are when he's near.

"Come here," he says gently, and when I cross the room he pulls me onto his lap and wraps his arms around me like he'll never let me go. He takes my hand in his, twisting the ring around my finger in slow circles, his mouth at my ear.

"Hello, Bella," he whispers, kissing my palm.

"Hello, Edward," I reply, and he smiles again.

He has always been mercurial to me, like a quicksilver flash in the darkness that I've chased through the shadows, but never quite caught. But there's stillness to him now, warmth not only in his eyes, but in the way he's touching me. Silence settles over us, and I curl into his chest, letting everything but him fade away like the last remnant of winter cloud drifting away across the sky.

I break the silence with a whisper into his chest, so quiet in the still, dark night. I was wrong earlier. There is one thing left to say, and I say it.

"I love you."

He reaches for the tangle of hair at my face, and brushes it gently away. A kiss to my forehead, a whisper in my ear. "My beloved,' he says, "forevermore."

He kisses me then, and it is the sweetest thing. He holds my face in his hands like I'm something rare and precious, like I'm something worth holding onto, and I hold him back as colors burst like rainbows before my eyes.

~~~ O ~~~

It's late when he returns to the sketchbook, and I watch him by the lamplight. Somehow light seems to have a different property when it falls on his skin. He seems to both absorb it and reflect it, and just as the shadows seem deeper on his skin than on mine, so too the light is brighter.

Maybe it's more than just the light.

My lips are deliciously swollen, and not all of those kisses were sweet. He pulled away with a murmured, "I can't," when I tried to move from sitting _on_ his lap to sitting _astride_ his lap, and sent me back to my place on the bed. I went, reluctantly, and waited for my racing heart to settle, for the throb to die.

But it hasn't. Not this time.

I felt him.

When I sat on his lap I felt him.

I did that to him.

Me.

And now I want more.

A contented smile plays at his lips, this complicated creature who has somehow become the simplest part of my life. His face is open and serene; he looks as though he might whistle or hum. His long lashes cast shadows on his cheeks, and he's all dark eyes and dark brows and untroubled peace.

Infuriatingly untroubled.

I want a little trouble.

I want him.

I clear my throat. "Edward," I begin, "you said something, and so did Esme, and I've been wondering about it."

He flips to a fresh page. "What's that, Bella?"

"She said that you find it hard to be around me not just because of my blood, but because you're fighting other things too. She said that you fight the temptation to have me in your thrall. What did she mean by that?"

He goes on drawing, frowning slightly. "She meant exactly what it sounds like she meant," he says carefully.

"But how? I mean, do you have some kind of mind trick or laser eyes or something? How exactly would you do it?"

"How do you know I haven't?"

"Well, would I know if you had?"

He rolls the charcoal slowly between his fingers, a knowing glint in his eyes. "Oh, believe me, Bella, you'd know."

I wait, hoping he'll elaborate.

But he doesn't.

He just keeps right on staring at me, a contemplative look in his eye.

I gather my courage, and dive in.

"Come on, Edward, tell me. Explain to me all the ways you'd bend me to your will." I glance pointedly at the sketchpad, really not sure if I'm doing this right at all. "Draw me a picture if you can't say the words."

He seems far from untroubled now. The chair rocks a little, creaking and grinding under his weight. I must be doing something right. "Be careful, Bella."

"Oh, I am being careful, Edward. If I wasn't being careful there would be less talking and more touching."

The charcoal snaps in two.

"Bella," he mutters, "what are you up to?"

"I don't know, Edward. I thought I had myself under control but it's getting harder to fight it. It's just always there lately. Sometimes it's just an undercurrent, a pull deep inside, an ache I can't shake. Other times, like now, it burns like fire and the only thought in my head is how much I want you."

The broken sticks of charcoal turn to dust beneath his fingers, and I wonder briefly if my eyes look as wild as his.

He leans forward a little, puts his lips together and blows the dust from the page, a cascading mist of sparkling black stardust floating through the air like a miniature meteor shower. He puts the pad on the floor, and my eyes widen at what I see there on the page. It is an arched neck under a rainstorm of crystalline droplets, clinging and flowing over the charcoal skinned girl. Her mouth is open and her eyes are closed, and there's shading high on her cheeks, as though her skin is flushed from heat or exertion.

Or both.

It's me.

Edward rises and raises a single finger, and listens for a long moment, and then he turns that finger in the air, beckoning me over. I cross the room slowly, not stopping until I'm almost touching him. I hold steady, refusing to be cowed.

"Is that me in your drawing, Edward? Is that me in the shower tonight?" He nods, and I feel the color rising on my cheeks as though he's run those black fingers over my skin. "Were you spying on me?"

"No," he says, "I don't spy on you in the shower. I do use my imagination though." He closes his eyes for a brief moment, and when he opens them again, I know I'm useless for anything but him. He drops his mouth to my ear. "Don't be embarrassed, Bella," he says. "I enjoyed your shower as much as you did."

Images of him in a quick flash sequence flicker and rush before my eyes. Edward backed up against a tree in the moonlight, jaw clenched and hard, fists pumping in time with my heartbeat once more. Edward with his head bowed, heels in the dirt and straining for release. Edward at his most dangerous, wild and coming and moaning my name.

The words fall from my mouth before I can stop them. "I want to do that to you, Edward."

Longing and warning flare bright in his eyes, and I feel powerful and dizzy, that I can make him look at me like that. He brings my hand up slowly, so slowly, and kisses my palm with gentle lips. His mouth lingers at my skin, cool breath and burning gaze, and then he grazes his teeth ever so lightly over my palm. Heat cascades over my body like a waterfall flowing, before finding a place to settle, intimate and low.

As if the tingling sparks on my hand aren't warning enough, his mouth drops to my throat, a gentle kiss to the racing pulse, and then his black eyes lock on mine.

"I told you once before, Bella. If you were to touch me like that, I would bite you. I wouldn't want to, but I would not be able to resist. Is that what you want? To be changed like that?"

"Yes," I gasp. "No. I don't know."

His hand drifts across my shoulder, down my arm and comes to rest at my waist, leaving a blazing trail of delicious heat through my clothes as it goes. I wonder, as I so often have, what that crazy burn would feel like on more delicate skin. Just the thought of it steals my breath away.

"I think -," he begins, and then he falters. He shakes his head a little, vulnerable suddenly, and I drop my hands to my sides. I want him so badly it hurts, but he has shown the most incredible self control with me.

I will do the same for him.

I will.

But then –

"Maybe," he whispers. "Maybe…"

He stares for a long moment.

Solemn.

Thoughtful.

He doesn't breathe, and then he moves slowly, turning me so my back is to the wall, and gathers my hands in one of his. Slowly he raises our joined hands above my head, black eyes trained on mine, tentative and tense.

His hold on my hands is loose, his message clear.

I can escape if I want to.

But I don't want to.

I do not want to.

I wait with breathless anticipation, gripping his hand and longing to move, to touch. But I don't try. I don't push. I submit. I surrender myself to his care and in a slow, graceful movement, he hitches my leg up around his hip. There are no kisses. No sighs. There are just his eyes locked on mine, lips parted in the breathless night. I feel him against me, hard and as ready as I am, but he pulls his hips away. His hand slides slowly down my thigh, and under fabric, and over skin that is aching for him.

I am trembling, yearning and open and ready, and long fingers glide and explore, curl and dip, and he knows.

_He knows_.

He knows where and how and the right pressure and I moan his name, hoarse and low.

It's better than I knew it could be.

His touch and his love combine to form something wholly new, something other and more, and I understand now why he was afraid. I am overcome as I could never be from the touch of another, from my own touch, from anything else. I'm pulled from the inside toward him and through him, in him, to inhabit and to own.

_Edward._

"Do you want me to stop?" he breathes.

No.

_No._

I am his captive and his conqueror, a willing participant, mistress and maiden and lover. I can do nothing but stare, open-mouthed and unwilling to move or to speak or to breathe lest the spell is broken, the chance gone, knowing there may not be another this side of the burning.

He runs his tongue over his lips, eyes glazed, black heat and _Bella_, he whispers, o_h Bella._ His hand, _his _hand, not mine, fingers deep and slow circles high, and my back arches against the wall.

"Don't close your eyes," he pleads, desperate, and I understand, with the last of my rational thoughts, that he needs the connection or he'll be lost. We both will be and I fight to keep my eyes open, fight, but it's so good and so close. It gathers and builds, the heat and the rush, and it breaks over me, washes me away and carries me high. I'm floating and flying, soaring and gone, heavy lidded but open, and I'm crying _Oh Edward, oh Edward, oh God._

When I wake in the morning, his scent lingers on my hands and on my pillow, where he lay with me afterwards. Under my pillow, he has placed the sketch of my entwined hands beside the dried orange blossom, and the charcoal smudges from his fingers bloom like faded bruises on my skin, the tattooed remains of restraint and bliss and love.

~~~ O ~~~

I drift through the morning at school in a haze, grinning like a fool at random, inappropriate moments. Angela asks if I'm alright, and I answer, "I'm great," with far too much enthusiasm.

I wonder if Edward went straight to the woods when he left me.

The thought of him in the pre-dawn gloom amongst the dense and misted trees, free of me and able to do what I long to.

The thought of Edward alone, his self control scattered to the four winds, a moan carried through the woods to echo in my ears.

The thought of my name on his lips, and his hand, the same hand that touched me, the scent of me, touching him.

_The thought of it._

My skins stings where I scrubbed the charcoal off, but even if I hadn't, I would still feel the weight of those marks.

Somehow I make it to lunchtime.

My room of choice on Wednesdays is the Biology lab. Mr Banner always goes to the diner for lunch, so I set the alarm on my phone and arrange the chairs so I have one to put my legs on. Then I lay my head down on the cold, hard counter. I spent some time in that delicious netherworld between being asleep and awake with the memories of last night until I'm warm and relaxed and sleepy, drifting away seamlessly into a dream of Edward.

His eyes are black and he's kissing me, distracting me, while he slips the moonstone ring from my index finger and slides it, with a knowing smile, onto the ring finger of my left hand. In my dream I gasp and gaze, wondering, and then the dream changes and the kisses stop. He just stares at me, his head tilted on an inquisitive angle, curious eyes and warm breath smelling of pickles, and it's all wrong, wrong, _wrong_, not Edward, and I wake with a start, breathing hard and disoriented.

The muted sounds of whooping and hollering drift in from the sports field outside, and fading footsteps echo outside the room, but from within the only sound is the sharp intake of breath by my right ear.

I turn towards the sound and a pair of wide brown eyes stare straight back at me.

The girl takes half a step back, and smiles shyly.

"Hi," she says. "I'm sorry if I woke you."

I rub my eyes, and blink the dream away, checking the time. Ten minutes till the bell.

"No, it's OK," I say. I want her, whoever she is, to leave so I can get a few more precious minutes sleep, but she shifts from one foot to the other, looking pointedly at the stool my legs are on. I swing my legs off, and she sits next me, arranging her books on the counter in a neat pile.

"I have Biology next. Do you mind if I sit here?"

"Sure," I say. No more sleep then.

"You're Bella Swan?" I nod. "I thought so. Don't worry, I don't have any friends either," she says. I open my mouth to tell her that's not why I'm here alone, and close it again when I realize how that will make her feel.

"I haven't seen you around before," I say.

"No," she says. "I'm new. My first day."

"Where are you from?"

"Near Seattle," she says, and without pausing for breath she launches into a series of seemingly endless questions that I answer by rote.

How old am I, do I live with my parents, do I have brothers or sisters, have I always lived here, where did I live before, am I going out of town for summer vacation, on and on until the bell goes, and I'm saved.

She seems small for her age, but she's accelerated, she says, skipped a year in junior school, but when we do the lab she can't tell anaphase from prophase and, more than that, has never even heard the words before. She giggles, telling me in a strange singsong voice that she's too nervous to think. She leaves the worksheet to me, staring and fidgeting while I complete the lab under her watchful eyes.

~~~ O ~~~

The final bell sounds so I don't hear my phone buzz at first. By the time I do hear it I'm at my locker, and there are two messages from Edward.

_Please go straight home after school, _says the first.

And then - _Did you get my message?_

I type out a quick reply, trying to hide my smile. I wonder if this day has been as long for him as it has for me, if he'll break his own rule and be waiting in my room when I get home.

Outside, the parking lot is the usual chaotic mess of kids and cars. I weave my way slowly through the heaving mass of humanity as they all try to escape for another day. It's hard not to push through, elbows out, when I catch a glimpse of my truck, but I force myself to dawdle. I prefer to wait until the lot has cleared and I can see what Edward has left for me in private.

Once the crowd has cleared, I slide my key into the lock, dump my bag on the floor, and climb in. Today, there's a book on the seat. It looks really old and very well loved, and faded gold lettering on the cracked red leather announces it be _The Four Quartets_ by T.S. Eliot. I'm not familiar with it, but it seems more like something Edward would give me.

Inside the front cover, Edward has written an inscription in black ink. _To Bella_, it begins, _I love you_, but the tail on the "u" whips across the page in a dark slash, as though something startled him as he wrote it. I flick through the book, sitting up a little straighter with every turn of a page. Each one is covered in the same phrase in the same black ink, descending from neat script into heavy, barely legible scrawl the further into the book I go.

_I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you…_ over and over again, covering every inch of white space on every page. His agitation is clear, evident in every blotch and stain on the pristine white, as though Edward's desperation has spilled like black blood onto the paper.

Taken in tandem, this book and his text messages have me reaching for the ignition, but a knock on my car window stops me.

The new girl is standing there, her pale face blotchy. I wind the window down.

"Are you OK?"

"I've lost my phone." She looks worried, shifting eyes left to right, and inside my truck and all over me.

"Do you need to call someone now? Here, you can use my phone."

She looks at my offered cell phone uncertainly, and shakes her head. "No, it's OK."

She just stands there, staring while l tap the steering wheel with impatience.

A car pulls into the parking lot, and stops under a tree in the corner. I don't recognize it, and its windows are tinted so dark it's impossible to see if anyone is inside. It looks far too expensive for Forks.

"Is that your Mom's car over there?" She looks over her shoulder, and the passenger window of the black Mercedes slides down an inch.

"No, that's not my Mom." Her voice cracks on the words, and I look at her properly. She's biting her lip, distracted and agitated. She's been crying, and she looks young and lost.

"Well, where do you live? I can drop you home."

"No," she says. "That's OK. Is there a payphone around here?"

"There's a phone at the diner."

"I don't know where that is. Could you drop me there?" I want to say no. I want to get home, but I can't leave her here alone with that car idling quietly in the corner.

"Get in."

I put Edward's book into my school bag while she climbs in. She seems to have rallied some, and the color returns to her face. The questions begin again as I turn the engine over, but I barely register what she's saying, because when I ease my truck out of the parking lot, the black car follows. It stays right behind me, turning when I turn, stopping when I stop, hugging my tail lights so close it must be almost touching the fender.

By the time we pull into the parking lot at the diner, and the black car pulls in next to me, the timing of it all is too much to be coincidence.

The text messages, the book, the car.

The girl and her questions.

She grabs her bag, and gets out of the truck.

"See you tomorrow," she says.

She seems nervous again, eyes darting from me to the diner but not at the black car. That car has to have something to do with her. Why would anyone be following me? It has to be her, and I realize, suddenly, I have no idea who she is.

I don't even know her name.

"Hey," I call. "Who are you?"

"I'm Bree," she says, with a small smile. "I'm Bree Tanner."

~~~ O ~~~

The black car still idles in the shadows. I have no idea what's going on, but I don't want to leave Bree here on her own if the car is following her, and I don't want to head for home if it's trailing me. My phone is in my hand and I'm about to call Edward, when it rings.

"Edward?"

"Go home, Bella," he says. "Right now. Go straight home and wait for me. Don't leave the house, don't answer the phone unless it's me, don't answer the door, do you understand me?"

"Edward, what's going on?"

"What did she ask you?"

"Who?"

"The new girl. Bree. What did she ask you?"

"I don't know. Nothing important. Just family and school stuff. Edward, I'm scared. I'm at the diner and a black Mercedes has been following me since I left school."

"I know," he says. "I'm driving it. Go home, Bella. I'll be there as soon as I can."

Somehow it's more frightening that it's Edward in that car. He has only shown himself to me twice in the daylight; once inside Newton's dingy store on a rainy day, and once in Port Angeles when he saved me from the van. I squint into the sunlight. It's not rainy today. There's barely a cloud in the sky.

I start up the engine, and head for home.

Edward follows me in the Mercedes all the way, and speeds off down the street once I'm inside. I check that my mother is inside and fine, and think of some excuse to call Charlie at work. He's fine, too.

There's nothing else to do but go upstairs and wait.

~~~ O ~~~

I don't have to wait long. I'm puzzling over the frantic scrawl in the book, rubbing my fingers over the ridges and bumps left from the pressure of Edward's pen when, for the first time, Edward climbs through my window in broad daylight.

There's no time to speak though, barely time to even register that he's in room with me. He crosses the room in three strides, and I'm back up against the wall, right where I was last night. His hands are against the wall either side of my head, my hands in his. He is black eyed and wild, and I am defenceless. His T-shirt is puckered and pulled as though he's been tearing at it, and his hair is a chaotic mess. His eyes are trained on my throat, right where the pulse is nearly leaping through my skin, and there's possession and ownership and fear in those eyes.

"Edward?"

A car drives by outside, and the clock ticks loudly next to my bed. My breathing is too loud and he won't look at me, won't meet my eyes.

This is not sexual.

This is something else entirely.

"Edward?"

Nothing.

"_Edward!"_

Finally his eyes snap to mine. "No," he mutters to himself, backing away and shaking his head. "Not like this." He retreats to that familiar place near the window, fists flexing a rapid beat just like they used to.

"I don't understand what's happening, Edward. Why were you following me? What does this have to do with Bree?"

"It has everything to do with that girl," he snaps. "Listen to me, Bella. I'm going away for a while, and while I'm gone you must do exactly as I ask you to. You mustn't leave the house, do you hear me? Stay home from school, invent an illness, do whatever you have to do, but do not leave the house."

His phone rings before I can answer, and he snatches it from his pocket, speaking into it so quickly I can only pick up snatches of what he's saying.

"_No!"_

"…_ must be another way."_

"…_ Esme …"_

He ends the call, and stalks across the room to me.

"This is impossible," he mutters, pulling at his hair. "There's been a change of plan. Go to school, Bella. Go, but when you're there you must stay away from that girl. Try not to be alone with her. Stick with Angela and her group. If the girl questions you, tries to get information from you, put her off. Be subtle. Don't make her suspicious. Do you understand me?"

"Why, Edward? What is it about her?"

"I don't know much yet. All I know is that she's been sent here to get information from you. _About _you. You must tell her nothing, do you hear me? Nothing. Not about yourself or me or the Quileute, no matter what she says or does."

"Sent here by who? Information for who?"

He won't answer. He takes my face in his hands, and rubs his thumb along my cheekbone, as though he's wiping away tears that haven't fallen yet. The fear is still there, though he tries to hide it. It's there in his eyes and the set of his mouth. My legs begin trembling, because I know the answer. Who but another vampire could make Edward afraid for me?

"When school finishes tomorrow, come straight home," he says. "And when you're home don't answer the door, don't leave the house, don't answer the phone unless it's me. Do you hear me, Bella?"

"Edward, you're scaring me. What about Charlie?"

"He'll be watched. The Quileute will watch you both."

"When will you be back?"

"I don't really know. I won't be gone long, I hope."

"But where? When? When are you going?"

His phone chimes, and he scans it quickly, frowning.

"Now." He pulls me to him, scowling and distracted, and kisses me hard. "I love you," he says. "I love you, I love you."

"Edward?"

"I'll phone you when I can."

And as quickly as he came, he leaves, disappearing through my window as though he was never here at all.

It's a long time before I move, not until the sweet taste of his lips has almost faded away.

The drawing of the wolf still hangs on my wall where it always has, and I take it down from the hook and run my fingers over the cold glass. The wolf is poised mid stride in the drawing, cunning eyes narrowed and alert, ready to leap should it need to. I've always known they were out there watching, howling their warning or their protest every night when Edward comes to me, but this is different. Edward has withdrawn his protection, has passed it over to them, and I feel untethered and adrift.

I draw the curtains tightly closed against the bright afternoon. I don't believe Bree will come here - I barely believe any of this is happening at all - but Edward does. I do not want her curious eyes here, near my mother and father.

Near me.

I feel exposed and hollow, as though our cocoon has been sliced open to reveal the contents of my room, and Edward's place in it, to all who may care to look.

I hang the drawing back on its hook, and lie on my bed with Edward's book of poetry, one hand wrapped tightly around my phone, waiting for his call.

~ O ~

Thanks so much for reading xx


	18. Chapter 18

So, this chapter is way overdue. Life got a little crazy. I also got behind in review replies, but I'll catch up now that life is a little less silly. In the meantime, thanks so much for reading and reviewing (if you do!).

Liz, Annette and Alby offered such excellent advice for this chapter. They're way smarter than me, but thankfully I'm smart enough to do what they suggest!

Disclaimer: Stephenie Meyer owns it all.

We left Bella in her room, nervous about Bree the spy and pining for Edward ….

~ Edward ~

I turn my back on Bella and run, and the forest, once so vibrant, drains of color. These trees, this earth, this place that has been so many things to me, has at different times been everything I've needed it to be, gives me nothing but black and grey shadows.

There have been days when the throb and hum of the woods pulsed in time with the reckless beat in me, when I was reduced to the most basic version of myself as the incessant craving for sex and blood consumed me. The green lichen and the ancient rocks streaked with pink and red, a blue feathered bird, the roar of the river and the howling wind, all of it as extravagant and wild as nature intended it to be, and I felt I belonged.

At other times, when I was calmer and able to be still, the forest gave me quiet shelter and succour. With the trees rising like church spires to the infinite blue and the veined leaves lit like stained glass windows under a fresco of painted clouds on the domed sky above, it was like a cathedral to me. It was a place for feeling and dreaming, a place for no one's thoughts but my own, a place for silent reverie and wonder, that miracles can happen for a sinner like me.

But not today.

Today as I run from Bella it's a claustrophobic place, a bleak catacomb where ghosts and shadows lurk, where the trees seem to crowd inwards and the sun is nothing but a pinpoint of light far, far out of reach. I feel the spirit of Charlie Swan's father and the fallen Quileute warriors trailing behind me. Feel their accusing eyes at my back, added to the weight of my own guilt and negligence.

I should have gone searching when Charlie Swan asked me to, when my family asked me to, when the Quileute asked me to. But I didn't.

I didn't.

It's all I can do not to turn back to Bella, but I have to believe Jasper is right. His words are all that keep me moving away from her.

_Every step you take away from her will lead you back_, he said_._

I use him, wrap his certainty around me like bandages soaked in his words and fastened with a prayer and a hope that he's right. I cannot allow myself to act on instinct. If I do, Bella will find herself backed up against that wall again, and this time I won't be able to stop myself from sinking my teeth into her throat, whether she's ready for it or not.

She'll never know how close I came today.

My phone rings, and Jasper's deep, calm voice reaches out to me across the miles, as it has so many times today.

"Did you leave?"

"Yes. I'm on my way to the meadow."

"Good. Carlisle and Esme will watch Bella and the girl. The Quileute will be watching too. She's safe for now. We can't risk the girl becoming suspicious if Bella stops going to school. We don't know how long this will take."

It's exactly what he said to me in Bella's room, but he knows I need to hear it again. If accusing spirits are at my back, then it's Jasper who stands at my shoulder, his even voice as much a part of the soundtrack of this frantic, frightening afternoon as the ringing of my phone. I picture Jasper running toward me even as we speak, running to me from the first word of the first phone call in the woods today. I did not need to ask. He knew what to do. From deep in the Alaskan wilderness, he summoned the might of the Quileute army and my own family and formulated plans that I was incapable of.

Rosalie and Emmett to the meadow, he said. They'll meet the Quileute there.

Get Bella home. The Quileute will watch her.

Esme will shadow the girl. Her phone could be tracked. Check it and return it to the girl. Esme must stay out of sight. Listen. Watch.

Carlisle watches Charlie Swan.

The girl said Seattle. You, Rosalie and Emmett meet Alice and I north of there.

And then he said, "Leave Bella. You have to leave her behind, brother."

And so I did.

I've put more faith in Jasper's knowledge and wisdom than I ever had in God, than I've even had in Alice's vision. I'm leaving Bella at her most vulnerable. There can be no doubt exactly what it is the red one wants from Bella. She knows enough of the Swan bloodline. She's tasted it. There's not a vampire in all creation who could know there was more of that ambrosial blood and not want it.

Including me.

"Don't go direct to Seattle," Jasper reminds me now. "Head south from the meadow. Go south and then east before you head north. Go wide. Real wide. You want to meet up with Alice and me north of Seattle. You don't want them knowing where you've come from, and don't go anywhere near the city until I'm with you. You got that?"

My bones feel brittle, my skin tight. I know what he's doing. If I ran as the crow flies, I could be north of Seattle in hours, but Jasper and Alice have a much greater distance to cover. He's making me go the long way around, making sure I have something, even if it's only running, to occupy me until he can get there. I dodge a sapling, feeling like I'll shatter if it touches me. I want Bella's touch. It's all I want. "I understand, Jasper."

His tone changes. Our business is done for the moment, but Jasper is rarely just business. He can't feel me from this distance, but gift or no, it's Jasper's nature to try to soothe and to calm. "Are you OK?"

"I want to kill her, Jasper."

"Well, that's the plan, brother."

"What if they're right? What if Charlie Swan and Harry Clearwater are right, Jasper? What if she can't be caught?"

"Then Bella will be changed. She'll be safe. Alice still sees it."

I understand now that this is the catalyst for Bella to be changed. There's no doubt about that. Whatever the outcome of this trip to Seattle, Bella will be turned as soon as I return to Forks, whether she consents or not. There's no other choice.

The meadow is close now. The closed and muted minds of the Quileute are like a wall of thick grey mist at the outer limit of my range. Harry Clearwater lingers on his deathbed, but Billy Black is there, and I probe his mind.

The Quileute mind is a strange and difficult place to be, not a place where clear thoughts and intentions can be easily found. Those things are controlled by Harry Clearwater, the free will of the Quileute taken away as they are compelled to obey a leader who's taken the noble and proud tribe of Bella's book, and turned them into slavish automatons. Billy Black is not the only warrior fighting against it, but it's he who fights the hardest.

He believes, as I do, that the lies being told to Charlie Swan and his wife, that the tacit permission given to me by Harry Clearwater to enter Bella's bedroom every night, are wrong. But I have the love of a woman at stake, and in that way, if no other, he has a freedom to fight against the lies that I do not. Billy Black has fought a grim and silent war against his Chief and against his very nature, has tried to push out and stretch against the hold that Harry Clearwater has on him, searching for a way out.

Today it seems he's given up the fight. His mind, though still unreadable in any meaningful way, is calmer than it's felt before. I understand why. Harry Clearwater could die at any moment. Billy Black just needs to wait it out, and he can put to rights all he believes is wrong.

All I can hope is that it doesn't happen while I'm gone, that Bella isn't left to deal with the fallout alone. It's just one more reason why it's so difficult to leave her.

I waste no time trying to claw through the thick fog to catch glimpses of what the rest of the wolves are thinking.

Instead I touch briefly on Emmett's thoughts. His head is a kaleidoscopic tumble of earnest intentions and small plans. He goes over combat manoeuvres, rehearsing so he's ready if it comes to a fight. He doesn't have a tactician's mind. He's like a cannonball waiting to be unleashed if brute force and unflinching bravery are required.

Underneath these thoughts of violence and destruction, he's overcome with admiration for Rosalie. He's awed at her terse, succinct summation of the situation to the Quileute, and how she's gleaned every piece of information she can from them in the limited time available. He adores her, and because of the strength of his feelings for her, he's all the more frightened for me.

I don't stay there long.

Rosalie's mind calls to me and I fall into it with relief. In the midst of this chaos, her thoughts are orderly and focussed. She is clinical and single minded. She is, in this moment, exactly what I need her to be, and I find in myself an unexpected echo of Emmett's admiration for her.

She has catalogued any information gained from the Quileute that she thinks is useful, and she flips through it in her mind like she's a general briefing a war room, knowing I'm close enough to hear. By the time I reach the meadow, I've downloaded anything I need to know from her, and so I do not slow my pace by even the smallest amount.

I burn past the Quileute as they fan out from the meadow. Jasper's instructions are that stealth and surprise are paramount, and I won't allow them to follow past the usual borders of their patrols. Rosalie has explained and, thankfully, they agree.

I look up for the few seconds it takes to pass through that circle amongst the trees. I focus on the colorless canopy surrounding the meadow, study the sky, squint at a bird, but even so I can still smell the flowers coming into bloom on the ground.

Alice's vision flashes unbidden in and out of my mind, every detail so familiar. I allow myself no more than a brief glimpse, like a camera zooming in for a flashing close up, before I shut it down. In that snapshot of a time yet to come, Bella's head lays against a bed of the very flowers coming to life beneath my feet. Her hand rests on my chest as we recline together, and one of her pale delicate fingers has slipped inside a space between the buttons on my shirt. It rests there on my skin, and the implied possession and casual intimacy of that single finger, that small gesture, makes my chest hurt. I can do nothing but grit my teeth and banish the image before I abandon everything and run back to her.

I phone Alice again, unable to help myself.

"Anything?"

"No," she says. "I don't see _anything_**. **Whatever she has planned is all wrapped up with Bella and the Quileute."

I shut the phone down without saying a word, and instantly it rings again.

"Esme."

"The girl is still at the diner, Edward. Some of Bella's friends are there and she's asking them about her, nothing in particular, just general information. I've slipped the phone back into her backpack, but she hasn't realized she has it back yet. When she does, I'll call again."

"Listen hard, Esme, and don't let her get away."

"I won't."

I phone Carlisle. Charlie Swan is still at work, oblivious.

We won't tell him and his wife of the threat until we have something worth telling. In the meantime there's nothing they can do but add worry and fear to a situation that already has plenty of both. Besides, telling them now would raise questions that I have no wish to answer yet. How do I explain why I was so close to Bella's school, tracking the thoughts of anyone who might think of her, without lies?

Rosalie, Emmett and I leave the Quileute far behind. We follow the river downstream and I deviate slightly, taking a mountain lion with vicious economy, draining it on the fly and tossing the body aside. Rosalie pauses to dispose of the carcass, chastising me for not taking more care. Her thoughts barely penetrate my head.

We run on through the long afternoon, grim and silent, the spirits trailing after me through the bleak forest. A brown and black bird wheels overhead, gliding and swooping on outstretched wings, and I wish briefly that I could become the hawk, just as the Quileute becomes the wolf. I wish that I could fly, that I could pluck Bella from her room with claws that would never break her skin, and carry her far away. Jasper's words are all I have to spur me on, mantra and prayer, chanted on a beat in time with my legs as they pound the earth, carrying me further and further away.

_Every step you take away from her will lead you back._

She's out of reach now, left far behind, but still and always my reason for everything.

We head south, as Jasper wishes us to, hitting the coast and staying there, following the curving sweep of bay and inlet, climbing cliffs and deviating inland around settlements and towns. Fearful of what I might do if left to my own devices, Emmett implores me to slow a little so they can keep up, and I try. I scan the beaches, searching for Bella, finding her finally in a rare piece of amber sea glass. Her eyes are red in Alice's vision, whether from her newborn state or from feeding on human blood is yet to be known, but one day, some day, they'll be the same color as the smooth luminous amber I now hold in my hand.

Finally, as we round the Cape of Disappointment, Rosalie determines we've gone far enough south and as we turn east, it feels as though the frantic activity of the past hours is over.

For the moment, everything that can be done, has been done.

There's nothing left to do but run.

~ O ~

With nothing to occupy my thoughts, the fear, until now a quiet guest in the other room, takes up full residence. It cuts me off at the knees, and I almost stumble, almost fall.

_Easy, Edward**.**_

Emmett, from behind me, concerned.

I shrug, and run on.

We hover at the edge of the night, the sun setting at our backs, a twilight like no other. Before Bella, my life was nothing but a series of long days rolling over me in endless waves with nothing much to distinguish one from the other, but not one of those empty days ever felt as long as this one. The descent from the heavenly night just past, of Bella's declaration and the intimacy that followed, into this hell was breathtaking in its swiftness and so recent that the shock still lingers, but still it feels as though it happened in another lifetime.

Rosalie calls sharply from a ridge behind me.

"You're drifting west, Edward."

A scattering of pale stars shine meekly in the darkening sky as I gauge my position. Rosalie is right, and I correct my course, fighting every instinct to either turn back to Bella or to head in a direct line to Seattle. I turn to my memories, dwelling on the moment when peace was obliterated, and the always lurking shadows exploded like poisonous clouds of black and grey, stealing the light.

I waited out of sight in the forest, as I do every day, for the sound of the lunchtime bell from the school below, longing for even a glimpse of Bella. The children poured from the gloomy buildings into the sunshine, but Bella was absent from the tangle of garbled thoughts. I sought Angela, but even her thoughts were occupied elsewhere. I began to write to Bella in the book I had for her, a short message on the yellowed page, the only words that seem worth anything anymore.

And then, as I wrote, I caught her name in an unfamiliar mind.

It belonged to a small girl in the parking lot below, her thoughts ringing as clear as a bell through the miasma of thoughts from the schoolyard. My head whipped up in horror at what I heard in the girl's mind.

_Bella Swan_, she was thinking. _Isabella Marie Swan. I don't know what I'm looking for. "Anything." That's what they said. "Anything you can find out about her," but there's nothing much in this truck. I wonder where she is. I'll find her. Befriend her. I have Biology next with Isabella Marie Swan. I wonder if she's in there already…._

Chilling thoughts that turned me to stone, but worse – far worse – were the images behind them.

Two faces.

One male and one female, both with blood red eyes.

The shock turned me to frozen stone, knowing what I'd do if I allowed myself to move. I emptied my mind and let the numbness creep up my limbs, my thoughts and actions diminished until only the smallest and most immediate actions could be taken.

My phone in one hand, the pen in the other. Hit the button, wait the agonizing seconds for Jasper to answer.

_Help me, Jasper. Oh God. She knows about Bella._

Writing words on the page, beautiful words turned ugly by the thick dark pen strokes.

_I love you I love you I love you._

Listen to Jasper. Do as he says. Trail the girl. Stay out of sight. Knowledge is power, brother, he said. Gather the knowledge, get the power.

Write the words.

_I love you I love you I love you._

Words at odds with the face looming in my vision. The horror of recognition.

I knew one of the faces in the girl's mind.

I'd seen it before.

It was the face that haunts Charlie Swan.

Those red eyes. That red hair. The color of his torment.

Black ink spilling on the page, the color of mine.

Write the words.

_I love you I love you I love you._

She tried to get at Charlie Swan for years, returned again and again, eluded the Quileute to escape and return, escape and return, and there she was in the mind of the girl.

My wretched arrogance, my certainty that she would not come while we were near, that she would never take on the Quileute when combined with a coven as large as ours, my certainty that she knew nothing of Bella's existence, let alone the nature of her blood.

I run on now far from Forks, with Rosalie and Emmett and the ghosts of the lost warriors in my wake, wishing I could go back to that last moment of peace under the trees.

Back to the moment before I realized that the red one is stalking Bella through this girl.

~~~ O ~~~

Trail the girl, Jasper said, so I did.

I slipped from the woods, hugging the shadows and staying out of sight, easing my way down the hall. I acted blindly on Jasper's instruction, not allowing myself to think independently. When I found the girl bent at Bella's locker, I took the girl's phone right from her backpack. Her thoughts were so loud then, and so full of Bella, that my hand hovered over the back of her head, venom screaming uncontrolled through my veins.

I wanted to drag that girl by the hair into the woods, to pick every thought of those vampires from her mind, and then rip that head from her shoulders.

I followed her along the hallway as she imagined herself changed, as she remembered briefly her bleak life on the streets of Seattle, the constant fear, her terror of the men and their hungry eyes, and the promise of freedom from it.

She remembered the male vampire whispering in her ear, making promises of safety and immortality, payment for services rendered.

She crept into the room where Bella slept, curious as to what was so special about this girl.

_I want it, _she thought, studying Bella as she slept. _Safety and immortality. I want it. They promised it to me._

Jasper's words were all I had.

_Be patient, brother. Hide and be patient. There will be a way. We just have to find it._

Bella woke, dishevelled and disoriented, and my heart broke at the sight of her. Bella of the good heart, sleepy, polite and compliant. Such easy prey.

The girl sat next to Bella all through her biology class, and I returned to the woods where I listened with unrelenting focus to every thought that went through her mind. She was concentrating on keeping her story straight, desperate not to trip up, not to disappoint _them_. Her eye was on the prize and Bella was her winning ticket.

Carlisle came to me, and we clutched each other in panic, his mind unfettered and screaming at me.

_Edward, _he was thinking, _Edward, I told you. So many times I told you. Why didn't you go looking for her? Why did you wait? Why?_

He knew the answer, and so I did not reply. My family had begged me countless times to search for the red one, the one Charlie Swan and the Quileute are so terrified of and, in my arrogance, I refused. I forbade them to interfere. I would go at a time of my own choosing, once Bella was changed and safe. I couldn't bear to leave her; besides, there was no hurry.

"No," I said, time and again, "it's _my_ life, _my _love. You will _not _interfere."

Like a petulant teenager refusing the wisdom of those who know better, and realizing now what I always knew anyway; that it was never my life to gamble with. It was Bella's.

And there she was, walking to her truck at the end of her school day with a secret smile I know was meant for me, dark hair and fair skin and pink cheeks, so pretty in the sunlight I wanted to cry. Carlisle had brought his car, and we waited and watched.

The girl approached again, and there was Bella, offering the girl her phone, a ride, information.

Carlisle and I listened, watching from the shadows, following as I willed her to do as I asked.

_Refuse the girl, get away from her, go home, Bella, go home where I can protect you._

Tell her to go home, Jasper said, so you can say goodbye.

~~~ O ~~~

Even following Jasper's circuitous route, we arrive at the rendezvous point north of Seattle long before Jasper and Alice. Esme phones. The girl discovered her phone in her backpack and made a call. She passed on what she'd learned about Bella to someone called Riley. There was nothing of significance, Esme said, and Riley encouraged her to keep talking to Bella. The girl is staying in a boarding house on the outskirts of Forks, and Esme is watching her.

There's nothing to do but wait, and it is torture. I fight once more not to run, not to scour Seattle until I find who we're looking for. Instead I turn myself to stone beneath the cloudless night, frightened that any decision, any movement of my own making will lead me wrong.

And beneath the stone façade, my mind revolves in ever decreasing circles, following the path that led me here, glimpses of the past merging with Alice's vision of the future. I remember a night long ago, Carlisle and Esme strolling arm in arm along a Parisian boulevard, her white fur muff and feathered hat turning heads under the white European sky. I remember Alice's skirt twirling as she and Jasper danced the jitterbug in an empty mid-western diner not long after they came to us, and years later, Rosalie and Emmett disappearing together for days in the Bavarian forest as Emmett's fruitless search for the sights and sounds of his homeland led us finally, thankfully, to Forks.

So many wintery skies along the way, so many decades alone and searching, wondering with less hope as the years passed by if there would ever be anyone for me.

I turn for comfort, as I always do now, to Bella.

There she lies in the meadow, carefree in my arms, purple and pink petals caught in her hair and laughter and love in her eyes.

I allow myself another comfort now too, as we three statues wait in the deepening darkness for Jasper and Alice to come to us.

_I was right to come._

_I was right to stay_.

I carry the guilt for many things with me, things I've done and things I haven't done, but not being able to stay away from Bella is no longer one of them. I release that heaviest of burdens to the stars above and let it float away, glancing at Emmett with more gratitude than I've ever felt for anything before. As the guilt lifts, it's replaced with a dreadful wondering at what would have become of Isabella Swan if he hadn't chosen Forks, if I hadn't come to that strange place under the clouds and fallen in love with her.

~~~ O ~~~

I glance up now at the stars, wishing Jasper and Alice would come. Dawn is still hours away, but they must be close now. I wonder if Bella is sleeping soundly, or if she tosses and turns, waiting for my call. It may be cowardly, but I can't bring myself to phone her, can't bear the thought of hearing her voice from so far away when there's nothing I can tell her yet to ease her mind. The Quileute and Carlisle are guarding her, and it's Carlisle I phone instead. Esme has nothing new to report from the girl, and the Swan house rests.

I begin to pace under the watchful eyes of Rosalie and Emmett, no longer able to be still. They're poised and ready to overpower me should I lose control and run for Seattle, but I shake my head minutely. I won't.

I walk to the river that lays placid and still by our waiting place, and look out over the silver water. I imagine swimming there with Bella some day, both of us naked and laughing as we glide through the water, easy and free. I imagine pulling her from the river to lay with me on the grass by the riverbank and making love to her, joyous not just because of the silence of her mind, but because it will be _Bella's _silence.

A flash of red in the reeds by the water catches my eye and I scoop up a small, round button. I wipe the dirt from it, blow gently to dry it, my heart cracking at the sight of it in the moonlight. It's raspberry in hue, exactly the same shade as Bella's lips.

She's everywhere.

It's always the same; a flash of her as I hunt or run, a glimpse of something that's the exact shade of her, or the feel of her, the look of her. The brown riverstone for her eyes, the pink glass, the same shade as the pretty pink that rushes her cheeks when I look at her, the feather, as white and soft as her skin. The things I draw for her, of her. The forest seems to whisper her name in a thousand different ways.

She's there in the freewheeling wingspan of the hawk that glides across the sky, out of reach even to me. She's there in the ancient bedrock, as strong and indestructible as she'll soon be, even the springtime sky is an echo of the blue veins that I've traced on her wrists. She's even there in the Quileute as they howl their protest at me whenever I climb in her window, and she's with her father as he stands stoic and strong in the meadow, determined to protect her.

She's everywhere.

Bella's oblivion to the meaning of these gifts charms me beyond reason. I believe she thinks they are just things, just meaningless objects that I drop at her feet, like a dog begging for favor, but they are far more than that to me. I've given her all that I had left of my father, the India head penny he found the day I was born, the same penny he gave to me as he lay dying, kept for me by Carlisle as I was born for the second time. And now, passed on to Bella as I truly come to life, reborn for the third and final time.

And the sprig of orange blossom I left for her that day. Rosalie thought it old fashioned and obvious but Bella, I'm sure, is oblivious to its meaning. When I was a boy, every bride walked down the aisle with the scent of citrus wafting from her bouquet, and that orange blossom meant far more to me than a pretty flower for a pretty girl. Bella keeps it under her pillow, as though it's a keepsake in our marriage bed, and I want to run again, back to her.

I wipe the dirt from the button, touch it to my lips, and hide it deep in my right pocket where it nestles with the sea glass. In my left pocket is the most precious gift of all, an antique band of silver and diamonds. My mother's engagement ring is the only thing I have left of her, just as the penny was all that remained of my father. Bella's left hand isn't visible in Alice's vision, and I have nearly driven myself wild imagining that ring sparkling prettily on her delicate finger.

Human custom has changed over the years, but in my time a man and a woman who loved each other got married. And before they did, the groom sought the permission of the bride's father.

I've made a vow to myself, a pledge as solemn and pure as the one I hope to make to Bella someday. There aren't many times I've done things right, but I will do this thing right.

I will not place that ring on Bella's finger without her father's blessing.

We are bound together by our love for this girl, Charlie Swan and I, and although the nature of our love for her is different, still it is the same. If the depths of it could be measured, her father and I would both be found drifting deep on the ocean floor, rudderless in her wake.

There's more to ask for than just her hand in marriage though. Much more. Permission is an easier thing to give than forgiveness.

I had once thought to win Bella's heart with the secrets she craves, but it's not her I seek to win over with the truth anymore.

It's her father.

The time for Bella to be changed is fast approaching, and when it comes, all I can do is hope that Alice's vision will be enough. It will be my gift to him, a peace offering, a plea and a promise. The only thing he's ever really wanted for Bella, the protection he can never truly give her.

I've drawn Alice's vision a thousand times as I've sat in Bella's room at night or waited in the forest by day, trying so hard to truly capture the happiness in her eyes, trying to make it perfect so that he can see what Alice and I see.

Whether he wishes me to the devil for it, or forgives me, in the end, it's all I have to give to him before I take his daughter away.

_Look what I can do for her._

_Look._

_She'll be safe forever, her blood gone, turned to venom and stone and never again to tempt one such as me._

_Look._

_Look what I can do._

_Please._

_Let me._

~ O ~

Thank you so much for reading x


	19. Edward Waits

So, this is an outtake from Edward's head that was originally part of the last chapter, however it would have made the chapter very long, and was slowing the action down so it was suggested that it be cut and posted as an outtake (thanks Alby!).

It's (mostly) been betaed, and for that I thank Liz, Alby and Annette – such wonderful generous women.

Disclaimer: Stephenie Meyer owns it all.

This outtake follows on from the last chapter - Edward waits on the outskirts of Seattle with Rosalie and Emmett for Jasper and Alice to come…

~ Edward ~

We stand immobile through the slow passing night, a trio of alabaster statues unblinking in the gloom. Backs to each other and senses alive, we wait in the woods for Napoleon to return from Elba, for Jasper to come back to us from his barren and frigid exile.

There's nothing to do with the time, but think. Rosalie and Emmett stand so close that their thoughts crowd in on me, and together they push Bella to the background. It's an unusual place for her to be and, at first, I don't fight it. I find myself willing, for the moment, to allow them to fill these empty hours of waiting.

Emmett's mind is calm. His senses tell him there's no immediate danger to us and so, with his pure and beautiful simplicity, he feels no need to be afraid. He doesn't know what tomorrow will bring, and so it holds no fear for him. He trusts Alice's vision more thoroughly than even she does, certain that it will deliver the happy ending Alice has foreseen. He passes the time by thinking of Rosalie, his mind rolling lazily around disjointed memories of her. Rosalie in a pink dress as she danced with him in the woods in Europe, Rosalie on a white bed gazing over her shoulder as he knelt behind her, Rosalie singing softly to him as he mourned the death of his human mother, singing the mountain songs he knew as a child and feeling his pain, he was sure, as acutely as he did.

A cold hand clutches at my stomach and my heart, the familiar longing to have someone – _Bella _– look at me like that, sing to me like that. All the fear that Emmett has discarded as useless comes to dwell in me, adds its stony weight to my own fear, and I push Bella away, unable to bear thinking of her just now.

My own thoughts amplify, drowning out theirs.

_Come, Jasper, come._

What do those vampires have planned for Bella? Why does the red one send a human girl to spy on her, to gather knowledge? They want her blood, but how do they plan to get it? And when?

_When?_

_Please come soon, Jasper, please please please …_

I lean a little closer to Rosalie, brush ever so lightly against her, so that her thoughts drown out my own. Her mind is an echo of mine, seldom a restful place to be. She does not, on this night, roll out the hard ball of guilt that lives within her. She doesn't draw it out to be polished much at all anymore, as she so often used to do. The sharp barbs of accusation she silently aimed so particularly at Carlisle when she was first changed have dulled with the passing of time, and the coming of Emmett.

Carlisle was never as oblivious to her feelings as she thought him to be, was in fact acutely aware of her helpless devastation at being drawn unwillingly into this strange afterlife. He carries his own guilt from his actions all those years ago, realizing too late that summoning love from flesh and bones wasn't routine alchemy, as he'd thought. Giddy with the newness of his love for Esme, and sure of success again, he tried to manufacture love between Rosalie and I where it could never exist. There was no spark between us, as there had been between Esme and him before he changed her, and Rosalie happened upon love on her own.

Emmett changed everything, and Rosalie's strident, if unspoken, accusations at Carlisle of changing her without her consent melted away as she begged Carlisle to do exactly that to Emmett. Her relief at discovering that Emmett loves this life, and loves her with a joy and purity that don't allow regret and blame to flourish, is immense, but as long as I remain on my own, the cold ball of guilt remains.

Unlike Emmett, Rosalie thinks of tomorrow and wonders what the day might bring. She and Carlisle are the only two of our family who've never killed for human blood, and it surprised us all – and Rosalie most of all - when she was almost overcome with thirst for Charlie Swan's blood. His rich earthy scent licked at her throat like fire when she faced him in the meadow, and her certainty that she could never be tempted by a human was replaced with an unwelcome understanding of what it is to truly be tempted. She understands better than she would ever have thought possible how the red one could thirst so acutely for the Swan blood, and the knowledge fuels her fears for Bella, and for me.

As the minutes and the hours pass by, Rosalie's mind eventually slows and drifts. She's almost drowsy, almost serene, thinking only of Emmett now, of his joy when he ranges through the woods around Forks, and how he loves her exactly as she's always wished to be loved, undemanding and accepting. How she tries, in her turn, to love him the same way. How she's never quite sure she succeeds.

_My mountain man_, she thinks, and the thought is meant for him alone.

I close them both out, visit with Alice's vision for a few moments, and then fling my senses outwards, like casting a net to the sea. I search for scents and minds both known and unknown to me, search for two pairs of vampires. I seek the red-eyed vampires I saw in Bree Tanner's mind, alert in case we are discovered prematurely and Jasper's requirement of surprise is lost, and search even more intently for Jasper and Alice, who must surely – _surely _– be close now.

There's nothing in these woods that shouldn't be here though, other than Rosalie, Emmett and me.

I push my mind further, stretching and clawing by inches, searching now, not for a scent or a thought, but for a _feeling_. A feeling that can only come from Jasper.

There's an aura surrounding him that's irresistible and compelling, a blend of emotion that radiates from him in waves and is made up of things he never thought would be his. Love and belonging, acceptance and peace, but chief among them – the part that truly brings us to our knees – is Jasper's wonder. It's a breathtaking thing, an outpouring of emotion so pure and pristine that it sometimes feels holy to me, for Jasper's wonder is not only that the love of our family exists, but that it exists for _him_.

Even if we couldn't feel it, we'd know it just the same, for Jasper is yet to call one of us to our faces by name. We are, in turn, mother, father, sister, brother, lover. He calls us what we are to him, miracles and saviours from the desolate existence that ended when Alice found him, and they, together, found us.

Jasper has an appeal that no one else does, and it's a bitter irony that people are drawn to him like lemmings to the sea, when he's the least capable of having them near. He's very careful always of keeping a safe distance from humans, but this time it was his own family who drove him away. He absorbed the intensity day after day of my thirst for Bella's blood, and Rosalie's for Charlie Swan, and it soon became more than he could bear. We nearly drove him insane with it, and worse, very nearly drove him to hunt for human blood once more, to kill when he has sworn he will never, ever weaken again.

Bella is the most real, the most alive, is truly a three dimensional entity only to Esme and I, but each one of my family has followed each step of Bella's odyssey to the meadow, to me. To us. They want her for me, and for themselves, but it's Jasper who wants her the most.

He feels my loneliness acutely, not just because of his gift, but because he once knew it himself. He knows what it tastes like, is familiar with the bitter ache and the hopeless yearning. He feels my desperation, feels the carefully disguised panic that I take such care to conceal from my family and from Bella.

Jasper's obsession with Alice's vision rivals my own, and the weight of his need for Alice to be right caused such a crisis of confidence in Alice, caused her to question her own gift so often and so profoundly that Alice came close to a breakdown. Alone in the Alaskan tundra, with only Jasper to dilute her intensity, Alice soon spun wildly out of control.

We've been unable to solve the riddle of why Alice is able to see her vision of the meadow, and no other part of the future. Why should that sliver of time be visible when nothing else involving Bella or the Quileute is? Acutely aware of Jasper's need for her vision to come to pass, she began searching the future relentlessly, trying endlessly to break through the black haze that shrouds the future. But there was nothing there but Bella and I in the meadow.

It makes no sense, and Alice began to question herself. She became completely fixated with her vision, felt the pressure of bringing it to bear more acutely than ever before, and her obsession summoned demons that she'd long hoped were banished forever. Fear took her over. Hazy memories of her human life came into sharper focus, memories of a life spent locked behind thick walls where madness reigned, and she began to question her sanity. Was her vision real, or had she manufactured it?

Alice became preoccupied with the jewellery that Bella wears in the meadow, jewellery Bella did not yet possess. How could her vision come to pass without it? The vagaries of the timing of her vision – does it take place this summer or next, or the one after that? Alice is never sure – were of no comfort to her. Bella must have the jewellery _now_, must be tied to the future and anchored to Alice's vision with it.

But it couldn't be found.

She searched every store in Anchorage, leaving Jasper alone with his reawakened thirst for human blood as much as she dared. She scoured the internet, had Esme and Rosalie looking everywhere for it, too. She drew the earrings and the ring over and over again, as if she could summon them into being if only she could draw them perfectly, was almost ready to try and make them herself, when she stumbled across a market stall near Anchorage. There sat a tribal elder, a wizened old silversmith, and when he unrolled his worn leather pouch to show her his wares, there were the very items Alice had been searching for.

Vindicated and relieved beyond words, the sun broke through the clouds and Alice's weary mind rested at last. Now Bella is tied to Alice's vision with those little slivers of silver jewellery, and Alice is calm once more. She holds her vision of the meadow close and sacred, wanting it desperately for me, for herself, for all of us, but wanting it most of all for Jasper. It will bring him another to call sister, and it will mean we can all be together again.

I've kept all this from Bella. I have no doubt that she can cope with the complicated personalities, with the dramas, both real and imagined, that plague my family. Indeed, one day soon she will have to learn to cope with them, but in the meantime, I have no wish to add to the burdens she already carries. It's a load comparable in heft and girth to Alice's flirtation with madness, with Jasper's battle to resist human blood, with Rosalie and Carlisle's guilt, with my love for her.

At just seventeen, she's questioning the validity of her relationships with her parents, coming to terms with her discovery of the supernatural world, with her father's role in this world, searching for the truth about her blood, saying goodbye to her beloved grandmother forever, grappling with the vast concepts of immortality and eternity, preparing to leave her family to join another, wondering if, when, who she'll kill. It's more than one person should have to bear, and I won't burden her more than I have to.

Soft moonlight falls upon we three shadows as we wait out the night, and I grow weary of my family. With no sign yet of Jasper and Alice, there's only Bella left to think of, and she comes to me now, like a wisp of mist slipping through the pre-dawn gloom. She melts into my skin and bones, and I let her, welcome her home. Rosalie and Emmett recede until they might as well be trees or rocks, for all that their thoughts intrude.

Bella will be denied no longer, and all I can think of now, is her.

~~~O~~~

It's hard to believe that it was just last night that Bella declared herself to me, that it was just last night that I backed her up against that wall, that I touched her as I've longed to, while she held me steady with her eyes. I left her sleeping restlessly in her bed just before dawn yesterday. I'd pushed myself to the outer limits of my control as I drank in the sight of her sleeping, the gentle sighs and aching moans, the feel of her in my arms, her _scent_. I could no longer bear the sound of my name falling from her lips, couldn't take another second of it. I kissed her forehead while she lay sleeping, kissed the dried and brittle orange blossom that she keeps under her pillow, and left her there to dream.

I took the forest before me, racing for distance before I lost all control. I hunted first, in such a state of disarray that I could not recall now, for anything in the world, the species of animal that I tore apart.

There would be time later to marvel at her declaration to me, to wonder at the miracle of her love, and her desire to be changed even without Alice's vision. But first, there were other less lofty feelings to deal with. The woods were no church to me this morning, no place for quiet repose and gentle reflection. They were a place where my wild wanting could be unleashed and tamed, at least for a time. I threw the shackles off, laid myself bare to the woods, and just _remembered_.

I relived it all this morning, how my endless fantasies began to be real, how I conquered the bloodlust enough to touch her. I felt it all as I leaned against an ancient tree; felt the curve below her ribcage, the swell of her hips, feminine and beautiful beneath my hand. How her leg slid up mine and wrapped around my hip, how she held me trapped and helpless. The shiver of her skin as I touched her, the slick heat and sweet fragrance, the shape of her mouth when she moaned my name, how her heart flew and her back arched and _God, how much I want her_. I turned to lean against the bark, frantic for her, driven to the edge of madness by my love for her.

And when I imagined it was her hand on me, and not mine, I was gone and done for, unhinged in the dirt. Bella's name was whispered to the earth and moaned to the red dawn sky.

Once.

Twice.

Three times.

The scent of her still on my hand.

To be joined that way.

My God, _this girl_.

I plunged into the river and swam for miles in water frigid from the spring thaw, colder even than my own skin, until I was finally calm enough to return home.

Esme was waiting for me there, as she is each morning, a quiet figure in the garden picking the pink and yellow flowers that Carlisle so loves. She wore her old straw hat and her worn leather gardening gloves, familiar props in the theater of her life, a place inhabited not by the children she once craved, but instead by the cardboard cut-out replicas of humanity that we sometimes, for her sake, pretend to be.

I went straight to my piano and began to play for her, to let her know I was home safe and that all was well.

The piano keys rose and fell beneath my fingers in an echo of Bella's breathing, the tempo of the notes in tandem with her heartbeat, sometimes so strong in my memory it feels as though my own heart has sprung to life again. The melody rang clear and true through the joyous haze of what had passed between us, through the dream of Alice's vision, the ivory keys coming to life beneath my fingers just as Bella did last night. I played for Esme and for myself, a winsome and wordless tune, elusive and haunting, while Esme arranged the flowers and waited for Carlisle to come home.

I could never stay away for long though.

The music ignited my need to be close to Bella once more, and I took up my place beyond the tree line near her school, as I always do. I took a book with me, something to pass the time while Bella was in class and not really in anyone's thoughts. I drew a little and read a little, trying to gather the scattered fragments of my concentration and shape them into something worthwhile.

Nothing but Bella could hold my attention this morning though, and Eliot's poetry was nothing but words on a page, black smudges with no meaning and no magic. I put the book aside and lay on a bed of pine needles, thinking of Bella until my chest hurt.

Bella's smile and thoughtful brown eyes hovered over me, a beautiful hologram shimmering just out of reach, just as her mysterious mind always does. She is Venus to me, Juliet and Aphrodite, Ishtar following me to the Underworld, and it struck me, as I lay there, that while my love for her - that broad and eternal thing – hadn't been enough to conquer my bloodlust, her love for me had been. It was her love, not mine, that gave me the strength to touch her, to overcome one form of lust with another and to finally reach for her the way I've longed to.

The morning drifted slowly by in an iridescent green haze, rays of golden sunlight dancing through the trees and the trill of birdsong far in the distance, until the lunchtime bell rang in the school below. It has become a part of my daily routine to leave Bella's gift in her truck once the lunchbreak is over, but I hadn't looked for a gift for her in the forest this morning. I had the book though, and while I probed the minds of the children spilling into the schoolyard for a glimpse of Bella, Eliot's words leapt at me.

_Time past and time future_

_What might have been and what has been_

_Point to one end, which is always present._

He wrote of time and its stealthy march toward the only ending there can ever be, and my heart soared. _Not for Bella, _I thought. _Not for me. _I've cheated death and so will she, and impatient sparks of energy snapped through my body. I was on my feet and pacing, wanting just to _begin_. We could go anywhere, Bella and I, see everything and be anyone, see it all and do it all together. Bella, bright as a comet with me trailing behind her, adoring and inferior, as she explores the world, cities and villages, deserts and frozen wastelands, the depths of the oceans and the highest peaks, nothing out of reach.

I can imagine no greater happiness than being a witness to her discovery of it all, to see the wonder in her eyes as her world expands into limitless, endless possibility, and when she grows weary of it and wants to be still, I'll do that too. I'll travel the world or sit quietly beside her, wherever she chooses to be.

~~~ O ~~~

I thought I would tell her everything.

It would have been so easy to lure her in anyway, even without the truth as bait. A vampire set on seducing a human will always succeed, and once a human is in the sexual thrall of one such as me, there's no end to what they will do for you. It wasn't a thing I'd ever done before, but despite my diet, despite my efforts to deny my nature, I am what I am. Blood and sex, the domains of the vampire, controlled by one and controlling with the other. To have a human girl, especially one as innocent as Bella, infatuated with me would take no more than a look, a touch, cool lips and knowing words. She'd do my bidding if I chose to have her do it. But even back then, before her father taught me what it is to love and Bella showed me how, I had some scruples.

Or do I give myself too much credit; was it scruples or was it ambivalence?

My family seek refuge in each other to beat back the bloodlust. Sex is the physical expression of love for their mate, as it is sometimes with humans, but it's a mask too. A distraction. Each member of my family buries the torment deep within the one they love, obscuring the thirst long enough and often enough to make it through.

There were times before Bella when I sought the same distraction with others of our kind, when long legs wrapped around me were all that held me together. There was little pleasure to be gained from it for me, but I sought it out sometimes just the same. A sexual encounter spent trying to block the thoughts of one's conquest until those brief mindless moments overcome them is hardly a satisfactory diversion but sometimes, when the craving for human blood became too much, it was enough.

Bella, the beautiful vampire in Alice's vision, held some appeal for me. The human Bella I first discovered in Forks did not. She wouldn't really exist for me in any meaningful way until she was changed, and at first I couldn't imagine how or why she'd come to be a vampire at all. My family had always seen my ability to read minds as a gift, but to me it was a curse that stole the joy from sex and made love impossible.

Bella's human state was a complication no one had foreseen, not even Alice, as was the existence of the Quileute and their supernatural powers. I could not, back then, imagine the vampiric Bella to be anything more than another brief sexual conquest, and it was my family who convinced me to pursue Bella when I would rather have turned away. It seemed to me to be a situation that required more effort than I was prepared to make just for the reward of that moment in the meadow, until Alice made me really look.

_Look at the vision again, Edward, look at your eyes._

When I looked closer, I barely recognized myself in that meadow, lying with this lovely stranger.

_There's something about her that's different from the rest, Edward. Look at your eyes. You're in love with her. Somehow, it happens_._ Go to her._

The Quileute were a minor obstacle, easy to manipulate. I saw it all in the human mind of Harry Clearwater the first time I ever went to the meadow; Charlie Swan, his daughter, and the blood that sings to us all.

More complications.

The best lies always hold a grain of truth, and we told Harry we could help his tribe against the red one, if she ever returned, but we'd need to get used to Bella's blood as well as her father's. If something happened to the father, we'd need the daughter's blood to help us fight with the Quileute, to help overcome the red one. Bring Charlie Swan to the meadow so we can meet him, but we'll also want access to his daughter, we said.

It was such a thin ruse, but Harry Clearwater would have agreed to almost anything to keep us around. He needed us to keep his tribe triggering to phase, and I knew it would make a kind of sense to him. He's a bitter man with an extremely narrow focus, terrified of death and seeing the world only as it pertains to his tribe. A man looking through a telescope is easy to sneak up on, and we had everything we needed from him in no time. We met Charlie Swan in the meadow, negotiating a worthless treaty to keep them all happy, and I began to follow his daughter.

And when I did, everything changed.

The first time I saw Bella Swan was in Port Angeles when I saved her from that van, and even from across the street I could smell her. I wanted to drain her even before the scent of her blood from that tiny cut on her hand invaded my senses. Maybe I would have, except that over the scream of her blood, beneath the alluring pulse in her throat, through the wailing of the bloodthirsty beast in my head imploring me to _just take her_, there was… nothing.

The miracle of her silent mind.

I tested her mind in that store in Forks, barely daring to believe it was possible.

But it was.

_It was._

So it began.

The whole world opened up for me with the realization that there could be a meaningful future for me with this girl. Any thought of a heartless seduction evaporated and I probed and pondered her father's mind in the meadow looking for clues to a purer beginning. How could this human girl allow me in, give herself to me, allow me to turn her? Intrigued and hopeful, it was her father who gave me what I needed.

Bella knew nothing of the supernatural world. Her father had steadfastly protected her from it, was in fact obsessed with keeping her innocent. But she was suspicious and curious, he knew that, and it worried him.

She wanted to know the truth.

It would be so easy to make a gift of it for her. Tied up in my gleaming smile and knowing eyes, I'd offer her the glittering prize she'd be unable to resist, the biggest weapon in my arsenal, an arrow straight to her heart.

_You want to know everything, Bella Swan? Well, here it is. I'm giving it to you. Look, Bella, look at all the things he's kept from you._

Half in love with her already, infatuated with the mere idea of a companion who could choose which of her thoughts were known to me, I'd make her an offering of the knowledge she craved. I would make her love me.

But time and again, the Swan family conspired to confound me.

This time, it was her father who set me on a different path.

I've never spent much time in a particular human mind. I've had no need, nor any wish to. I flit in and out, checking that my family is safe from suspicion when we're masquerading as humans. The rest is just incessant white noise. Even during the years of my sullen, deadly adolescence, I never stayed long in the minds of my victims. Just long enough to pass judgement before delivering my particular brand of punishment.

The human mind has seemed to me to be a place of petty ideas and small thoughts, self indulgent and self conscious. Repetitive and dull. People, as a rule, do not surprise me.

But Charlie Swan did.

Here was a man consumed with love for his wife and daughter, a man so committed to protecting his only child from the threat of physical harm, from the knowledge that there could even _be _a threat, that he gave up half a lifetime with the woman he loves. And even when his wife and daughter returned to him, he lived resigned to his daughter's suspicions of him, made no move to dissuade her from her incorrect assumptions if it meant she'd look no further for the truth.

He thought of his wife and daughter, of their needs and their safety, before he thought of his own, in a way that my family have never had to.

I expected to love his daughter, but I never expected to have such respect and admiration for him.

Someone more noble than me might still have walked away, but Alice's vision was still there, unchanged, and the long nights at Bella's window began.

There were times I slipped up. Times when the vampire had more to say than the man, times when I said things to Bella that I shouldn't have, but with time I became better at it. I drew Bella a thousand different ways while I sat in that room with her, taming the beast a little more with every stroke. If Charlie Swan could live without his love for nearly two decades, I could make some sacrifices for mine. Still, there were times when even Alice's vision wasn't enough, when her blood sang to me so clear and so true that it was only her father who saved her.

I used him in the meadow in more ways than one. I drank in his scent, desperately hoping that familiarity with his blood might help me to resist hers. It was Jasper's suggestion, and it helped a little. Although the call from each of them is different, Charlie's rich, earthy scent the perfect foil to the sweet purity of Bella's blood, the nature of the torment is the same.

But it was inhabiting his mind that was so often the only difference between life and death for Bella. It was seeing what human love can mean, what it looks like and feels like, but more than that, it was seeing his daughter through a father's clear eyes, instead of through my bloodthirsty ones.

The letters and drawings she sent her father every week of her life, the drawing he kept on the fridge of the way she always wanted her family to be. Bella forging out a relationship with her grandmother despite the distance between them, her determination to love an old woman who was almost a stranger to her, her awareness that she was taken from Charlie's mother, just as much as she was taken from him.

Bella leaving the only home she'd ever known without question or protest so that her parents could be together, her joy at being with her father once more, at seeing her mother so happy.

He showed me that Bella was worth the torment, worth the wait and the risks. He showed me the goodness of her heart when all I could see was blood. He led me on a far different path than I would otherwise have taken.

Someday I'll tell Charlie Swan that time and again he did what he'd always wanted to do.

He protected his daughter from a bloodthirsty vampire.

He saved her from me.

He's the reason I've never told Bella the truth about the role of her and her father in this shadowy underworld. He's a man, just a man, a small and weak thing in a powerful world he has no business being in, trying desperately to control a situation that is, at best, only half known to him. He might as well be trying to put out the sun.

I'll take his daughter away, but I've vowed to leave him with something more than just the certain knowledge of her safety in return.

Bella and her mother once spoke bitter words of dignity and love, how the loss of one diminishes the other. Every time the wolf howls and I climb through Bella's window, I steal a little more of Charlie Swan's dignity away, but I've vowed to make a gift of whatever tattered scraps remain. It's not much, no more than a threadbare fragment, but when the time comes – fast approaching now – for Bella to learn the truth, it will be his to tell.

The night slowly lifts in the woods near Seattle, like a curtain rising to reveal a softly lit stage. Rosalie, Emmett and I wait quietly in the wings for Jasper to come, afraid to speak or to act lest we get our lines wrong. We wait with patience stretched as thin as a high note on a violin, wait for our director to take up his place beyond the orchestra pit, to lead us where he may.

And far away in Forks, far less the ingénue now than her father would wish her to be, the star in this dangerous and deadly show, the lead in every dream and fantasy I have, sleeps softly in her bed.

~ O ~

Thank you so very much for reading.

Peace & love to all xxxx


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